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Title: The Commune of London: and other studies
Author: Round, John Horace
Language: English
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THE COMMUNE OF LONDON
THE
COMMUNE OF LONDON
AND OTHER STUDIES
BY J. H. ROUND M.A.
AUTHOR OF ‘GEOFFREY DE MANDEVILLE’,
‘FEUDAL ENGLAND,’ ETC.
With a Prefatory Letter by Sir Walter Besant
WESTMINSTER
ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE AND CO.
2 WHITEHALL GARDENS
1899
BUTLER & TANNER,
THE SELWOOD PRINTING WORKS,
FROME, AND LONDON.
Prefatory Letter
Dear Mr. Round,
I have to thank you for kindly letting me see the advance proofs
of your new book. It is difficult for me to explain the very great
advantage which the study of your books has been to me in my endeavour
to get at the facts, especially those of the 12th century, connected
with the history of London. For instance, I have found in your pages
for the first time a working theory of the very difficult questions
connected with the creation of the municipality. I have adopted your
conclusions to the best of my ability with, I hope, an adequate
expression of thanks to the source from which they are derived.
I would also point out the great service which you have rendered to
the history of the City by giving, for the first time, the exact truth
regarding the conveyance of the Portsoken to the Priory of the Holy
Trinity, an event which has been hitherto totally misunderstood.
Thirdly, I must acknowledge that it is only from your pages, especially
a certain appendix to ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ that one can understand
the ordinary position of the clergy of the City of London in the 12th
century.
It is unnecessary for me to enumerate many other obligations which I
owe to your pages.
I remain, dear Mr. Round,
Very faithfully yours,
WALTER BESANT.
OFFICE OF THE SURVEY OF LONDON,
_July 6th, 1899_.
Contents
I
THE SETTLEMENT OF THE SOUTH-SAXONS AND EAST-SAXONS 1
II
INGELRIC THE PRIEST AND ALBERT OF LOTHARINGIA 28
III
ANGLO-NORMAN WARFARE 39
IV
THE ORIGIN OF THE EXCHEQUER 62
V
LONDON UNDER STEPHEN 97
VI
THE INQUEST OF SHERIFFS (1170) 125
VII
THE CONQUEST OF IRELAND 137
VIII
THE POPE AND THE CONQUEST OF IRELAND 171
IX
THE CORONATION OF RICHARD I 201
X
THE STRUGGLE OF JOHN AND LONGCHAMP (1191) 207
XI
THE COMMUNE OF LONDON 219
XII
THE GREAT INQUEST OF SERVICE (1212) 261
XIII
CASTLE-WARD AND CORNAGE 278
XIV
BANNOCKBURN 289
XV
THE MARSHALSHIP OF ENGLAND 302
Preface
The paper which gives its title to this volume of unpublished studies
deals with a subject of great interest, the origin of the City
Corporation. In my previous work, ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville’ (1892), and
especially in the Appendix it contains on ‘The early administration
of London,’ I endeavoured to advance our knowledge of the government
and the liberties of the City in the 12th century. In the present
volume the paper entitled “London under Stephen” pursues the enquiry
further. I have there argued that the “English Cnihtengild” was not the
governing body, and have shown that it did not, as is alleged, embrace
a religious life by entering Holy Trinity Priory _en masse_. The
great office of “Justiciar of London,” created, as I previously held,
by the charter of Henry I., is now proved, in this paper, to have been
held by successive citizens in the days of Stephen.
The communal movement, which, even under Stephen, seems to have
influenced the City, attained its triumph under Richard I.; and
the most important discovery, perhaps, in these pages is that of
the oath sworn to the Commune of London. From it we learn that the
governing body consisted at the time of a Mayor and “Échevins,” as in
a continental city, and that the older officers, the Aldermen of the
Wards, had not been amalgamated, as has been supposed, with the new and
foreign system. The latter, I have urged, is now represented by the
Mayor and Common Council. That this communal organization was almost
certainly derived from Normandy, and probably from Rouen, will, I
think, be generally admitted in the light of the evidence here adduced.
This conclusion has led me to discuss the date of the “Établissements
de Rouen,” a problem that has received much attention from that eminent
scholar, M. Giry. I have also dwelt on the financial side of London’s
communal revolution, and shown that it involved the sharp reduction of
the ‘firma’ paid by the City to the Crown, the amount of which was a
grievance with the citizens and a standing subject of dispute.
The strand connecting the other studies contained in this volume is
the critical treatment of historical evidence, especially of records
and kindred documents. It is possible that some of the discoveries
resulting from this treatment may not only illustrate the importance
of absolute exactitude in statement, but may also encourage that
searching and independent study of ‘sources’ which affords so valuable
an historical training, and is at times the means of obtaining light on
hitherto perplexing problems.
The opening paper (originally read before the Society of Antiquaries)
is a plea for the more scientific study of the great field for
exploration presented by our English place-names. Certain current
beliefs on the settlement of the English invaders are based, it is
here urged, on nothing but the rash conclusions of Kemble, writing,
as he did, under the influence of a now abandoned theory. In the
paper which follows, the value of charters, for the Norman period, is
illustrated, some points of ‘diplomatic’ investigated, and the danger
of inexactitude revealed.
Finance, the key to much of our early institutional history, is dealt
with in a paper on “The origin of the Exchequer,” a problem of long
standing. On the one hand, allowance is here made for the personal
equation of the author of the famous ‘Dialogus de Scaccario,’ and some
of his statements critically examined, with the result of showing that
he exaggerates the changes introduced under Henry I., by the founder
of his own house, and that certain alleged innovations were, in truth,
older than the Conquest. On the other, it is shown that his treatise
does, when carefully studied, reveal the existence of a Treasury audit,
which has hitherto escaped notice. Further, the office of Chamberlain
of the Exchequer is traced back as a feudal serjeanty to the days of
the Conqueror himself, and its connection with the tenure of Porchester
Castle established, probably, for the first time. The geographical
position of Porchester should, in this connection, be observed.
In two papers I deal with Ireland and its Anglo-Norman conquest. The
principal object in the first of these is to show the true character of
that alleged golden age which the coming of the invaders destroyed. It
is possible, however, of course, that a “vast human shambles” may be,
in the eyes of some, an ideal condition for a country. Mr. Dillon, at
least, has consistently described the Soudan, before our conquest, as
“a comparatively peaceful country.”[1] In the second of these papers I
advance a new solution of the problem raised by the alleged grant of
Ireland, by the Pope, to Henry II. As to this fiercely contested point,
I suggest that, on the English side, there was a conspiracy to base the
title of our kings to Ireland on a Papal donation of the sovereignty
of the island, itself avowedly based on the (forged) “donation of
Constantine.” No such act of the Popes can, in my opinion, be proved.
Even the “Bull Laudabiliter,” which, in the form we have it, is of
no authority, does not go so far as this, while its confirmation by
Alexander III. is nothing but a clumsy forgery. The only document sent
to Ireland, to support his rights, by Henry II. was, I here contend,
the letter of Alexander III. (20th September, 1172), approving of what
had been done. That he sent there the alleged bull of Adrian, and that
he did so in 1175, are both, I urge, although accepted, facts without
foundation.[2]
The method adopted in this paper of testing the date hitherto adopted,
and disproving it by the sequence of events, is one which I have also
employed in “The Struggle of John and Longchamp (1191).” The interest
of this latter paper consists in its bearing on the whole question
of historic probability, and on the problem of harmonising narratives
by four different witnesses, as discussed by Dr. Abbott in his work
on St. Thomas of Canterbury. This is, perhaps, the only instance in
which I have found the historic judgment and the marvellous insight
of the Bishop of Oxford, if I may venture to say so, at fault; and it
illustrates the importance of minute attention to the actual dates of
events.
Another point that I have tried to illustrate is the tendency to erect
a theory on a single initial error. In “The Marshalship of England” I
have shown that the belief in the existence of two distinct Marshalseas
converging on a single house rests only on a careless slip in a
coronation claim (1377). A marginal note scribbled by Carew, under a
misapprehension, in the days of Elizabeth, is shown (p. 149) to be the
source of Professor Brewer’s theory on certain Irish MSS. Again, the
accepted story of the Cnihtengild rests only on a misunderstanding of
a mediæval phrase (p. 104). Stranger still, the careless reading of a
marginal note found in the works of Matthew Paris has led astray the
learned editors of several volumes in the Rolls Series, and has even
been made, as I have shown in “the Coronation of Richard I.,” the basis
of a theory that a record of that event formerly existed, though now
wanting, in the Red Book of the Exchequer.
* * * * *
The increasing interest in our public records--due in part to the
greater use of record evidence in historical research, and in part,
also, to the energy with which, under the present Deputy-Keeper of the
Records, their contents are being made available--leads me to speak of
the contributions, in these pages, to their study.
A suggestion will be found (p. 88) as to the origin of the valuable
“Cartæ Antiquæ,” of which the text too often is corrupt, but which, it
may be hoped, will soon be published, as they are at present difficult
to consult. In the paper on “The Inquest of Sheriffs” I have proved
beyond question the identity of the lost returns discovered at the
Public Record Office, and so lamentably misunderstood by their official
editor. But the most important, and indeed revolutionary, theory I have
here ventured to advance deals with what are known as the Red Book
Inquisitions of 12 and 13 John. It is my contention that this Inquest,
the existence of which has not been doubted,[3] though it rests only on
the heading in the Red Book of the Exchequer, never took place at all,
and that these ‘Inquisitions’ are merely abstracts, made for a special
purpose, from the original returns to that great Inquest of service
(as I here term it) which took place in June, 1212 (14 John). It is
singular that this conclusion is precisely parallel with that which
experts have now adopted on another great Inquest. “Kirkby’s Quest,”
it is now admitted, having been similarly misdated in an official
transcript, and again, in our own time, by an officer of the Public
Record Office, was similarly shown by a private individual to consist,
as a rule, “of abridgments only of original inquisitions” ... “extracts
from the original inquisitions made for a special purpose.”[4]
Thus, under John, as under Edward I., “the enquiry itself was a much
wider one” than would be inferred from the Red Book Inquisitions
and “Kirkby’s Quest” respectively. And, in both cases, its date was
different from that which has been hitherto assigned.
I cannot doubt that the theory I advance will be accepted, in course of
time, by the authorities of the Public Record Office. In the meanwhile,
I have endeavoured to identify all the material in the ‘Testa de
Nevill’ derived from the returns to this Inquest, and thus to make it
available for students of local and family history.
It is needful that I should say something on the Red Book of the
Exchequer. One of the most famous volumes among our public records, it
has lately been edited for the Rolls Series by Mr. Hubert Hall, F.S.A.,
of the Public Record Office.[5] The inclusion of a work in the Rolls
Series thrusts it, of necessity, upon every student of English mediæval
history. It also involves an official _cachet_, which gives it
an authority, as a work of reference, that the public, naturally,
does not assign to the book of a private individual. That a certain
percentage of mistakes must occur in works of this kind is, perhaps, to
be expected; but when they are made the vehicle of confused and wild
guesswork, and become the means of imparting wanton heresy and error,
it is the duty of a scholar who can prove the fact to warn the student
against their contents.[6] It is only, the reader must remember, a
stern sense of duty that is likely to compel one to turn aside from
one’s own historical researches and devote one’s time and toil to
exposing the misleading theories set forth in an official publication
issued at the national expense. A weary and a thankless task it is; but
in Mr. Eyton’s admirable words: “the dispersion of error is the first
step in the discovery of truth.”
In my ‘Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer,’ issued last year
for private circulation only, and in two special articles,[7] I have
partially criticised Mr. Hall’s work and the misleading theories it
contains. Of these criticisms it need only be said that the ‘English
Historical Review,’ in a weighty editorial notice, observes that “The
charges are very sweeping, but in my opinion they are made out.... I am
bound to say that, in my opinion, Mr. Round has proved his case.”[8]
The further exposures of this official work, contained in these
pages[9]--especially in the paper on “the Inquest of Sheriffs,” which
illustrates its wanton heresies--justify my demand that the authorities
should withdraw it, till revised, from circulation.
The paper on “Castle-ward and Cornage” not only proves that the two
were distinct, and gives the real explanation of their juxtaposition in
the ‘Red Book,’ but contains novel information, to which I would invite
attention, on the constableship of Dover Castle. The early history of
this important office has been altogether erroneous.
Lastly, I must speak, very briefly, of the criticism to which my
work has been exposed, although I do so with much reluctance. Honest
criticism one welcomes: difference of opinion one respects. But for
that uncandid criticism which endeavours to escape from facts, and
which is animated only by the wish to obscure the light, no excuse
is possible. The paper on “Anglo-Norman Warfare” will illustrate the
tactics to which I refer; and the weight to be attached to Mr. Oman’s
views may be gathered from that on “Bannockburn.” But, apart from the
necessity of these exposures in the cause of historical truth, the
papers which contain them will, I trust, be found of some service in
their bearing on the tactics and poliorcetics of mediæval England,
and on the introduction, in this country, of tenure by knight service.
It is the object also of the “Bannockburn” paper to illustrate the
grossly-exaggerated figures of mediæval chroniclers, a point which,
even now, is insufficiently realized. Here, and elsewhere, it has been
my aim to insist upon the value of records as testing and checking our
chronicles, placing, as they do, the facts of history on a relatively
sure foundation.
I
The Settlement of the South-and East-Saxons
I would venture, at the outset, to describe this as a “pioneer” paper.
It neither professes to determine questions nor attempts to exhaust a
subject of singular complexity and obscurity. It is only an attempt to
approach the problem on independent lines, and to indicate the path
by which it may be possible to extend our knowledge in a department
of research of which the importance and the interest are universally
recognised.
It is the fine saying of a brilliant scholar, I mean Professor
Maitland, that “the most wonderful of all palimpsests is the map of
England, could we but decipher it.”[10] But the study of place-names
has this in common with the study of Domesday Book. The local worker,
the man who writes the history of his own parish, is as ready
to explain the name it bears as he is to interpret the Domesday
_formulæ_ relating to it in the Great Survey, without possessing
in either case that knowledge of the subject as a whole which is
required for its treatment in detail. On the other hand, the general
student, from the very wideness of his field, is deprived of the
advantage conferred by the knowledge of a district in its details. In
the hope of steering a middle course between these two dangers, I have
specially selected two counties, both of them settled by the Saxon
folk--Sussex, with which I am connected by birth; and Essex, with which
are my chief associations. And further, within these two counties I
restrict myself to certain classes of names, in order to confine the
field of enquiry to well-defined limits.
The names with which I propose to deal are those which imply human
habitation. And here at once I part company with those, like Kemble
and other writers, who appear to think it a matter of indifference,
so long as a name is formed from what they term a patronymic, whether
it ends in-ham or-ton, or in such suffixes as-hurst,-field,-den,
or-ford. To them all such names connote village communities; to me
they certainly do not. If we glance at the map of Domesday Sussex,[11]
we see the northern half of the county practically still “backwoods”
eight centuries ago.[12] If we then turn to the Domesday map prefixed
to Manning and Bray’s Surrey, we find the southern half of that county
similarly devoid of place-names. In short, the famous Andredswald was
still, at the time of the Conquest, a belt, some twenty miles in
width, of forest, not yet opened up, except in a few scattered spots,
for human settlement. The place-names of this district have, even at
the present day, a quite distinctive character. The _hams_ and _tons_
of the districts lying to the north and the south of it are here
replaced by such suffixes as _-hurst_, _-wood_, _-ley_, and _-field_,
and on the Kentish border by _-den_. We may then, judging from this
example, treat such suffixes as evidence that the districts where
they occur were settled at a much later time than those of the _hams_
and _tons_, and under very different conditions. The suffix _-sted_,
so common in Essex, is comparatively rare in Sussex, and we cannot,
therefore, classify it with the same degree of certainty.
Taking, therefore, for our special sphere, the _hams_, the _tons_, and
the famous _ings_, let us see if they occur in such a way as to suggest
some definite conclusions. The three principles I would keep in view
are: (1) the study, within the limits of a county, of that distribution
of names which, hitherto, has been studied for the country as a whole;
(2) a point to which I attach the very greatest importance, namely,
the collection, so far as possible, of _all_ the names belonging to
this class, instead of considering only those which happen to be
now represented by villages or parishes; (3) the critical treatment
of the evidence, by sifting and correcting it in its present form.
The adoption of these two latter principles will gravely modify the
conclusions at which some have arrived.
There is, as Mr. Seebohm’s work has shown, nothing so effective as
a special map for impressing on the mind the distribution of names.
Such a map is an argument in itself. But although I have constructed
for my own use special maps of Sussex and Essex, they cannot here be
reproduced.
I now proceed to apply the first principle of which I spoke, that of
examining a single county in the same way as others have examined
the maps of England as a whole. I doubt if any county would prove
more instructive for the purpose than that of Sussex, of which the
settlement was developed in isolation and determined by well-defined
geographical conditions. Whatever may be said of other suffixes,
Mr. Seebohm has shown us that, even allowing for a large margin
of unavoidable error, the terminations _-ing_ and _-ham_ are not
distributed at random, but are specially distinctive of that portion
of England which was settled by the earliest immigrants and settled
the most completely. As a broad, general conclusion, this is virtually
established. Now, if we turn to the map of Sussex and ask if this
general principle can also be traced in detail, the first point to
strike us, I think, is the close connection existing between the _hams_
and the rivers. The people, one might say, who settled the _hams_ were
a people who came in boats. Although at first sight the _hams_ may seem
to penetrate far inland, we shall find that where they are not actually
on the coast, they almost invariably follow the rivers, and follow them
as far up as possible; and this is specially the case with the Arun and
its tributary the Western Rother. Careful examination reveals the fact
that, while to the south, round Chichester Harbour and Selsea Bill, we
find several _hams_, and find them again to the north in the valley of
the western Rother, there are none to be found in the space between,
which shows that the men who settled them found their way round by the
Arun and not overland. I need hardly observe that the rivers of those
days were far larger than the modern streams, and their water level
higher.
It is anticipating somewhat to point out that the same examination
shows us a large group of _tons_ covering this district away from the
river, where we find no _hams_. Evidently these suffixes do not occur
at random.
And now let us pass from the extreme west to the extreme east of the
county. Here, instead of a group of _tons_ with a notable absence of
_hams_, we find a most remarkable group of _hams_, absolutely excluding
_tons_. To understand the occurrence of this group on the Rother--the
eastern Rother--and its tributaries, it is essential to remember the
great change that has here taken place in the coast line. Unfortunately
Dr. Guest, who first discussed the settlement of Sussex, entirely
ignored this important change, and his followers have done the same.
The late Mr. Green, for instance, in his map, follows the coast line
given by Dr. Guest. Thus they wholly overlooked that great inlet of
the sea, which formed in later ages the harbours of Winchelsea and
Rye, and which offered a most suitable and tempting haven for the
first Saxon settlers. The result of so doing was that they made the
earliest invaders pass by the whole coast of Sussex before finding, at
Selsea Bill, one of those marshy inlets of the sea, where they could
make themselves at home. Therefore, argued Mr. Grant Allen,[13] “the
original colony occupied the western half of the modern county; but the
eastern portion still remained in the hands of the Welsh.” The orthodox
hypothesis seems to be that the settlers then fought their way step by
step eastwards, that is, towards Kent, reaching and capturing Pevensey
in 491, fourteen years after their first landing.[14] As against this
view, I would suggest that the distribution of Sussex place-names is
in favour of vertical not lateral progress, of separate settlements up
the rivers. And, in any case, I claim for the group of _hams_ at the
extreme east of the county the position of an independent settlement,
to the character of which I shall return.
I must not wander too far from what is immediately my point, namely,
the grouping of the _hams_ and _tons_ not haphazard but with cause.
Even those students who discriminate suffixes, instead of lumping them
together, like Kemble and his followers, make no distinction, I gather,
between _hams_ and _tons_. Mr. Seebohm, for instance, classes together
“the Saxon ‘hams’ and ‘tuns,’”[15] and so does Professor York Powell,
even though his views on the settlement are exceptionally original
and advanced.[16] There are, however, various reasons which lead me
to advance a different view. In the first place, the wide-spread
existence, on the Continent, of _ham_ in its foreign forms proves this
suffix to be older than the settlement. ‘Ton,’ on the other hand, as
is well known, is virtually absent on the Continent, which implies
that it did not come into use till after the settlement in England.
And as _ham_ was thus used earlier than _ton_, so _ton_, one need
hardly add, was used later than _ham_. The cases in Scotland, and in
what is known as “little England beyond Wales,” will at once occur
to the reader. Canon Taylor states of the latter that the Flemish
names, such as Walterston, “belong to a class of names which we find
nowhere else in the kingdom,” formed from “Walter and others common in
the 12th century.”[17] But in Herefordshire, for instance, we have a
Walterston; and in Dorset a Bardolfston, a Philipston, a Michaelston,
and a Walterston, proving that the same practice prevailed within the
borders of England. Nor need we travel outside the two counties I am
specially concerned with to learn from the ‘Ælfelmston’ of Essex or
the Brihtelmston of Sussex that we find _ton_ compounded with names of
the later Anglo-Saxon period. A third clue is afforded by the later
version, found in the _Liber de Hyda_, of Alfred’s will. For there we
find the _ham_ of the original document rendered by _ton_. It is clear,
therefore, I contend, that _ton_ was a later form than _ham_. Now the
map of England as a whole points to the same conclusion; for _ton_ is
by no means distinctive, like _ham_, of the districts earliest settled.
And if we confine ourselves to a particular county, say this of Sussex,
we discover, I maintain, an appreciable difference between the
distribution of the _hams_ and the _tons_. While the _hams_ follow the
course of the rivers, the scene of the first settlements, the _tons_
are largely found grouped away on the uplands, as if representing a
later stage in the settlement of the country. In connection with this I
would adduce the “remarkable passage,” as Mr. Seebohm rightly terms it,
in one of King Alfred’s treatises, where he contrasts the “permanent
freehold _ham_” with the new and at first temporary _ton_, formed by
‘timbering’ a forest clearing in a part not previously settled.[18] It
is true that Mr. Seebohm, as I have said, recognises no distinction,
and even speaks of this example as “the growth of a new _ham_”; but
it seems to me to confirm the view I am here advancing. It is obvious
that if such a canon of research as that _ham_ (not _ton_) was a mark
of early settlement could be even provisionally accepted, it would
greatly, and at once, advance our knowledge of the settlement of
England. Although this is nothing more than a ‘pioneer’ paper, I may
say that, after at least glancing at the maps of other counties, I can
see nothing to oppose, but everything to confirm, the view that the
settlers in the _hams_ ascended the rivers (much as they seem, on a
larger scale, to have done in Germany); and a study of the coast of
England from the Tweed to the British Channel leads me to believe that,
as a maritime people, their settlements began upon the coast.
I now pass to my second point--the insufficient attention which has
hitherto been paid to our minor place-names. Kemble, for instance,
working, as he did, on a large scale, was dependent, so far as names
still existing are concerned, on the nomenclature of present parishes.
And such a test, we shall find, is most fallacious. Canon Taylor, it
is true, has endeavoured to supplement this deficiency,[19] but the
classification of existing names, whether those of modern parishes or
not, has not yet, so far as I can find, been even attempted. Hitherto
I have mainly spoken of Sussex, because it is in that county that
place-names can be best studied; the Essex evidence is chiefly of
value for the contrast it presents. The principal contrast, and one
to which I invite particular attention, is this: confining ourselves
to the names I am concerned with--the _ings_, _hams_, and _tons_--we
find that in Essex several parishes have only a single place-name
between them, while in Sussex, on the contrary, a single parish may
contain several of these place-names, each of them, surely, at one time
representing a distinct local unit. This contrast comes out strongly in
the maps I have prepared of the two counties, in which the parishes are
disregarded, and each place-name separately entered. I do not pretend
that the survey is exhaustive, especially in the case of Sussex, as I
only attempt to show those which are found on an ordinary county map,
together with those, now obsolete, which can safely be supplied from
Domesday. But, so far as the contrast I am dealing with is concerned,
it is at least not exaggerated.
As the actual names are not shown, I will now adduce a few examples.
In Sussex, Burpham is composed of three tythings--Burpham, Wepham,
Pippering; Climping comprises Atherington and Ilesham; Offham is
included in South Stoke; Rackham in Amberley; Cootham in Storrington;
Ashton, Wellingham, and Norlington in Ringmer; Buddington in Steyning;
and Bidlington in Bramber.
In Essex, on the other hand, ‘Roothing’ does duty for eight parishes,
Colne for four, Hanningfield, Laver, Bardfield, Tolleshunt, and
Belchamp for three each, and several more for two. There are, of
course, in Sussex also, double parishes to be found, such as North and
South Mundham, but they are much scarcer.
We may learn, I think, a good deal from the contrast thus presented.
In the first place, it teaches us that parochial divisions are
artificial and comparatively modern. The formula that the parish is
the township in its ecclesiastical capacity is (if unconsciously
adopted) not historically true. Antiquaries familiar with the Norman
period, or with the study of local history, must be acquainted with
the ruins or the record of churches or chapels (the same building,
I may observe in passing, is sometimes called both _ecclesia_
and _capella_[20]), which formerly gave townships now merged in
parishes a separate or quasi-separate ecclesiastical existence. In
Sussex the present Angmering comprises what were once three parishes,
each with a church of its own. The parish of Cudlow has long been
absorbed in that of Climping. Balsham-in-Yapton was formerly a
distinct hamlet and chapelry. Conversely, the chapelries of Petworth
have for centuries been distinct parishes.
In Essex we have examples of another kind, examples which remind us
that the combination or the subdivision of parishes are processes as
familiar in comparatively modern as in far distant times. The roofless
and deserted church to be seen at Little Birch testifies to the fact
that, though now one, Great and Little Birch, till recently, were
ecclesiastically distinct. In the adjoining parish of Stanway, the
church, similarly roofless and deserted, was still in use in the last
century.
Again, the civil unit as well as the ecclesiastical, the village, like
the parish, may often prove misleading. It is, indeed, very doubtful
whether we have ever sufficiently distinguished the manor and the
village. If we construct for ourselves a county map from Domesday, we
shall miss the names of several villages, although often of antiquity;
but, on the other hand, shall meet with the names of important manors,
often extending into several parishes, often suggesting by their forms
a name as old as the migration, yet now represented at most by some
obscure manor, and perhaps only by a solitary farm, or even, it may be,
a field. In Sussex, for instance, the ‘Basingham’ of Domesday cannot
now be identified; its ‘Belingeham’ is doubtful; its ‘Clotinga’ is now
but a farm, as is ‘Estockingeham.’ ‘Sessingham’ and ‘Wiltingham’ are
manors. In Essex ‘Hoosenga’ and ‘Hasingha’ occur together in Domesday,
and are unidentified. Nor have I yet succeeded in identifying
‘Plesingho,’ a manor not only mentioned in Domesday, but duly found
under Henry III. Morant, followed by Chisenhale-Marsh, identified it
wrongly with Pleshy. Such names as these, eclipsed by those of modern
villages, require to be disinterred by archæological research.
Another point on which light is thrown by the contrast of Essex and
Sussex is the theory tentatively advanced by Mr. Maitland in the
‘Archæological Review,’ that the Hundred and the township may, in
the beginning, have been represented by the same unit.[21] Broadly
speaking, he adduced in support of this hypothesis the originally
large township of Essex, proved by the existence of a group of
villages bearing the same name, comparing it with the small Hundreds
characteristic of Sussex. But in Sussex, I think, the small Hundreds
were coincident with those many small townships; while in Essex the
scattered townships are coincident with larger Hundreds. And this leads
me to suggest that the Saxon settlements in Sussex lay far thicker
on the ground than those found in Essex, and that we possibly find
here some explanation of the admitted silence as to the East-Saxon
settlement contrasting with the well-known mention of that in Sussex.
It seems to me highly probable that Essex, in those remote times,
was not only bordered and penetrated by marshes, but largely covered
with forest. It is, perhaps, significant that in the district between
Westham and Boreham, some twenty-five miles across as the crow flies,
there is not a _ham_ to be found.
From this I turn to the opposite extreme, that group of _hams_ on the
‘Rother’ and its tributaries, thirty-seven in number. Isolated alike
from _ings_ and _tons_, and hemmed in by the spurs of the Andredswald,
it is, perhaps, unique in character. Nowhere have I lighted on a group
of _hams_ so illustrative of the character of these settlements, or
affording a test so admirable of the alleged connection between this
suffix and the _villa_ of the Roman Empire.
One of the sections of Mr. Seebohm’s work is devoted to what he terms
“the connection between the Saxon ‘ham,’ the German ‘heim,’ and the
Frankish ‘villa.’” This, indeed, it may fairly be said, is one of the
important points in his case, and one to which he has devoted special
research and attention. Now, I am not here dealing with the equation
of ‘ham’ and ‘villa.’ If I were, I should urge, perhaps, that, as with
the ‘Witan’ of the English and the ‘Great Council’ of the Normans,
it does not follow that an equation of words involves their absolute
identity of meaning. I confine myself to the suffix ‘-ham.’ “Its early
geographical distribution,” Mr. Seebohm has suggested, “may have an
important significance.” With this, it will be seen, I entirely agree.
But, if the distribution is important, let us make sure of our facts;
let us} as I urge throughout this volume, test and try our evidence
before we advance to our conclusion. When Mr. Seebohm informs us
that “the ‘hams’ of England were most numerous in the south-eastern
counties, finding their densest centre in Essex,” the statement must
startle any one who has the least acquaintance with Essex, where the
termination ‘-ham’ is comparatively rare in place-names. On turning
to Mr. Seebohm’s map, one is still further surprised to learn that
its “local names ending in ‘ham’” attain in Domesday the enormous
proportion of 39 per cent. The clue to the mystery is found in a note
that “in Essex the _h_ is often dropped, and the suffix becomes _am_.”
For the whole calculation is based on a freak of my old friend, the
Domesday scribe. The one to whom we are indebted for the text of the
Essex survey displayed his misplaced scholarship in Latinizing the
English names so thoroughly, that not only did Oakley, the first on
the list, become ‘Accleia,’ but even in the accusative, “Acclei_am_
tenet Robertus.” Thus we need travel no further than the first name
on the index to learn how Mr. Seebohm’s error was caused. Elmstead,
Bonhunt, Bentley, Coggeshall, Danbury, Dunmow, Alresford, and many
other such names, have all by this simple process been converted into
‘hams.’ I hasten to add that my object in correcting this error is
not to criticise so brilliant an investigator and so able a scholar
as Mr. Seebohm, but to illustrate the practical impossibility of
accomplishing any scientific work in this department of research until
the place-names of England have been classified and traced to their
origin. I am eager to see this urgent work undertaken county by county,
on much the same lines as those adopted by the Government in France.
It seems to me to be eminently a subject for discussion at the Annual
Congress of Archæological Societies.
If it were the case that the English _ham_ represents the Roman
_villa_, this remarkable group on the borders of Kent and Sussex should
indicate a dense Roman settlement; but of such settlement there is, I
believe, no trace existing. Conversely, we do not find that the sites
of Roman villas are denoted by the suffix _ham_.[22]
From considering this group as a whole, I advance to two settlements
on what is known as the Tillingham River, namely, Billingham and
Tillingham. One would not easily find names more distinctive of what
Kemble insisted on terming the mark system, or what later historians
describe as clan settlement. Parenthetically, I may observe that while
_ham_ is common in Sussex, the compound _ingham_ is not. This is well
seen in the group under consideration. The same may, I think, be
said of Essex, while in North Suffolk _ingham_ begins to assert its
predominance. The frequent occurrence in Norfolk and Lincolnshire
renders it a note of Anglian rather than Saxon settlement.[23] And
now for Billingham and Tillingham. Billing is one of the most common
of the so-called patronymics; and there is a Tillingham in Essex.
Whether we turn to the specialist works of such writers as Stubbs and
Green, or to the latest _compendia_ of English history as a whole, we
shall virtually always read that such names as these denote original
settlement by a clan.[24]
In venturing to question this proposition, I am striking at the root
of Kemble’s theory, that overspreading theory of the Mark, which,
as it were, has shrunk from its once stately splendour, but in the
shadow of which all our historians since his time have written. Even
Professor York Powell, although he rejects the mark theory,[25] writes
of “the first stage” of settlement: “We know that the land was settled
when clans were powerful, for the new villages bear _clan names_,
not _personal names_.”[26] The whole theory rests on the patronymic
_ing_, which Kemble crudely treated as proving the existence of a mark
community, wherever it occurs in place-names.[27]
Now the theory that _ing_ implies a clan, that is, a community united
by blood or by the belief in a common descent,[28] may be tested in
two distinct ways. We may either trace its actual use as applied to
individuals or communities; or we may examine the localities in the
names of which it occurs. I propose to do both. The passage usually
adduced to prove the ‘clan’ meaning is the well-known genealogy in
the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: “Cerdic was Elesing, Elesa was Esling,
Esla was Gewising,”[29] etc. Even Mr. Seebohm reluctantly admits, on
this “evidence of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle,” that _ing_ was used as
alleged. But it always seemed obvious to me that this passage, so far
from proving the ‘clan’ meaning, actually proved the opposite, namely,
that the patronymic changed with every generation. Again, if we turn
from the Chronicle to the Anglo-Saxon charters, we find _inga_ normally
used to denote the dwellers at a certain place, not the descendants of
a certain man. It is singular that Kemble, although he was the first to
make an exhaustive study of these charters, classed such names with the
other _ings_, from which they were quite distinct.[30] His enthusiasm
for the ‘mark’ carried him away. In Sussex, we have, as it seems to
me, a very excellent illustration; the name of Angmering, the present
form, occupies, as it were, a medial position between the “Angemare” of
Domesday and the “Angmeringatun” of Alfred’s will. Here, surely, the
Angmeringas were those who dwelt at Angmer, not a ‘clan’ descended from
a man bearing that name.
I will not, however, dwell on this side of the argument, more
especially as I would rather lay stress on the other line of attack.
For this is my distinctive point: I contend that, in studying
the place-names into which _ing_ enters, attention has hitherto
exclusively, or almost exclusively, been devoted to those now
represented by towns or villages. With these it is easy to associate
the idea of a clan settlement. But what are we to make of such cases
as our Sussex Billingham and Tillingham? We shall search for them in
vain in Lewis’ Topographical Dictionary; and yet they are names of
the same status as fully developed villages. As a Sussex antiquary
has observed (though I cannot accept his explanation): “In the names
of many farms we shall likewise find names which also mark whole
parishes in the county.” Canon Taylor has unconsciously recorded, in
the adjoining county of Kent, evidence to the same effect, observing
that “the lone farmhouses in Kent, called Shottington, Wingleton,
Godington, and Appleton, may be regarded as venerable monuments,
showing us the nature of the Saxon colonization of England.”[31] I say
that this evidence is unconscious, for the Canon applies it only to the
evolution of the _ton_, and seems not to have observed its bearing on
that compound _ing_, which he, like Kemble, fully accepts as proof of
a clan community. From Shottington and Godington, as from Billingham
and Tillingham, Kemble would have confidently deduced the settlement
of a ‘mark’ or clan community; and yet, when we learn what the places
are, we see that they represent a settlement by households, not by
communities.
Here, then, is the value of these cases of what we may term arrested
development: they warn us against the rashness of assuming that a
modern or even a mediæval village has been a village from the first.
The village community may be so far from representing the original
settlement as to have been, on the contrary, developed from what was at
first but a farmstead. The whole argument of such scholars as Professor
Earle here and Dr. Andrews in America is based on the assumption that
the land was settled by communities, each of them sufficiently large to
have a head, whether civil or military. To that supposition such names
as I have mentioned are, I think, fatal.
Yet another point must be touched on as to this alleged patronymic. To
Kemble, as I have said, it was of small moment what suffix his ‘marks’
bore. Indeed, those that denoted forest were to him specially welcome,
because he associated the idea of a ‘mark’ with that of a forest
clearing. But we who have seen that such suffixes as _-field_, _-hurst_
and _-den_ are distinctive of those districts untouched by the early
settlers cannot recognise such names, for instance, as the Itchingfield
or Billingshurst of Sussex as denoting village communities. Again, in
the Anglo-Saxon charters the characteristic _den_ of Kent is frequently
preceded by _ing_; and if these _dens_ were clearly from the context
only forest pastures for swine, we must here also reject the _ing_ as
proof of a clan community. One may also glance in passing at such names
as the “Willingehala” of Essex, now “Willingale,” and ask whether a
clan community is supposed to have settled in a hall?[32]
I trust that I have now sufficiently shown that even where _ing_
genuinely enters into the composition of a place-name it is no proof
of settlement by a clan. Kemble looked on the typical ‘mark’ as “a
hundred heads of houses,” which he deemed “not at all an extravagant
supposition.”[33] I think that even at the present day a visit to the
_hams_ and _tons_ of Sussex, and, in some cases, to the _ings_, would
lead us in practice to the opposite conclusion, and would throw the
gravest doubt on the theory of the village community. I was trained,
like others of my generation, to accept that theory as an axiomatic
truth; but difficult as it is to abandon what one has been so taught,
the solitary manor house, the lonely farm, is a living protest against
it. The village community of the class-room can never have existed
there. On paper it holds its own: _solvitur ambulando_.
But the fact that a place bearing a typical clan name may prove to have
been but a single homestead takes us farther than this. _Ing_, which
Canon Taylor has described as “the most important element which enters
into Anglo-Saxon names,” has been held to denote settlement not merely
by a clan, but by a portion of a tribe bearing, both in England and
abroad, one common name. Kemble insisted strongly upon this,[34] and is
duly followed by Canon Taylor[35] and others. On the same foundation
Mr. Andrew Lang has erected yet another edifice, tracing the occurrence
in scattered counties of the same clan name to the existence of exogamy
among our forefathers. And this ingenious suggestion has been adopted
by Mr. Grant Allen.[36] But the very first instance he gives, that of
the Hemings, will not stand examination.[37]
As yet I have been dealing with those ‘clan names’ in which the
presence of the _ing_ is genuine; and I have been urging that it
is not _proof_, as alleged, of settlement by a clan. I now pass
to those place-names in which the _ing_ is not genuine, but is
merely a corruption. That such names exist has always, of course,
been admitted,[38] but their prevalence has not been sufficiently
recognised. And not only are there large deductions, in consequence,
to be made from the so-called clan names, but even in cases where the
_ing_ is genuine the prefix is often so corrupt that the name of the
clan deduced from it is altogether wrong.
Let us take some instances in point. Kemble deduced the existence
of the Brightlings (‘Brightlingas’) from Brightling in Sussex and
Brightlingsea in Essex. Nothing, at first sight, could seem clearer.
And yet, on turning to Domesday, we find that the Sussex Brightling
is there entered as Brislinga--suggesting that Somerset Brislington
from which Kemble deduced the Brislings--while Brightlingsea appears
in the Essex Domesday as ‘Brictriceseia,’ and in that of Suffolk
as ‘Brictesceseia,’ from which forms is clearly derived the local
pronunciation ‘Bricklesea.’ So much for the Brightlings. Yet more
striking is the case of an Essex village, Wormingford. Kemble, of
course, detects in it the name ‘Wyrmingas.’ Yet its Domesday name is
Widemondefort,’ obviously derived from ‘Widemond,’ the name of an
individual.[39] Here the corruption is so startling that it is well
to record the transition form ‘Wiremundeford,’ which I find in the
13th century.[40] Now, as I have often to point out in the course of
my historical researches, however unpopular it may be to correct the
errors of others, those errors, if uncorrected, lead too often to
fresh ones. Thus, in this case, the ‘Wyrmingas,’ wrongly deduced from
Wormingford, have been claimed by scholars as sons of the ‘worm,’
and, therefore, as evidence that ‘Totemism’ prevailed among the
Anglo-Saxons. It would take me, I fear, too far afield to discuss the
alleged traces of Totemism; but when we find Mr. Grant Allen asserting
that “the oak has left traces of his descendants at Oakington in
Cambridge” (shire), one has to point out that this place figures in
Domesday as ‘Hochinton(e)’[41] in no fewer than five entries, although
Kemble derives from it _more suo_ the ‘Æcingas.’ But a few more
instances of erroneous derivation must be given in order to establish
clearly the worthlessness of Kemble’s lists. How simple it seems to
derive, with him, the ‘Storringas’ and ‘Teorringas’ from Storrington,
Sussex, and Tarrington, Herefordshire, respectively. Yet the former,
in Domesday, is ‘Storgetune’ or ‘Storchestune,’ while the latter is
‘Tatintune’ in both its entries. It might be suggested that the error
is that of the Domesday scribe, but in this case I have found the
place entered in several documents of the next century as Tadinton
or Tatinton, thus establishing the accuracy of Domesday. Indeed, in
my experience, the charters of the 12th century prove that Domesday
nomenclature is thoroughly deserving of trust. The climax of Kemble’s
derivations is reached perhaps in Shillingstone, from which Dorset
village he duly deduces the ‘Scyllingas.’ For, as Eyton has shown,
its name was ‘Acford,’ but, from its Domesday tenant, Schelin, it
became known as Ockford Eskelling, Shilling Ockford, and finally, by
a yet bolder corruption, Shillingstone.[42] As if to make matters
worse, Kemble treats ‘Shilling-Okeford’ and ‘Shillingstone’ as two
distinct places. Could anything, one asks, be more unfortunate than
this? Alas, one must answer Yes. The great clan of the ‘Cypingas’ is
found in eight counties: at least so Kemble says. I have tested his
list and discovered that the names which prove the existence of his
clan are Chipping Ongar, Chipping Barnet, Chipping Sodbury, Chipping
Campden, Chipping Wycombe, Chipping Warden, and Chipping Norton. Even
the historical tyro would avoid this wild blunder; he would know that
Chipping was about as much of a clan name as is Cheapside. After this
final example, it can hardly be disputed that Kemble’s lists are merely
a pitfall for the unwary.
Yet we still follow in his footsteps. Take such a case as that
of Faringdon, which Mr. Grant Allen, we have seen, selected as a
typical instance of the _ing_ patronymic in place-names.[43] If we
turn to Domesday, we find in Berks a ‘Ferendone,’ in Northants a
‘Ferendone’ or ‘Faredone,’ in Notts a ‘Ferendone’ or ‘Farendune,’ in
Hants a ‘Ferendone.’ These names were all the same; and yet they have
become ‘Farndon’ in Notts and Northants, ‘Faringdon’ in Berks, and
‘Farringdon’ in Hants. Farringdon, therefore, is no more a clan name
than is the Essex Parndon, the ‘Perenduna’ of Domesday. But, indeed, in
Essex itself, there is an even better illustration. We learn from Canon
Taylor that “the Thurings, a Visigothic clan, mentioned by Marcellinus
... are found ... at Thorrington in Essex.” Kemble had previously
described them as “likely to be offshoots of the great Hermunduric
race, the Thyringi or Thoringi, now Thuringians, always neighbours
of the Saxons,[44] and claims the Essex Thorrington” as their
settlement.[45] Now Thorington in the first place was not a _ton_, and
in the second place had not an _ing_. Both these forms are corruptions.
In Domesday it occurs twice, and both times as ‘Tor_induna_.’ With
this we may compare ‘Horn_induna_,’ which is the Domesday form of
Horndon, and occurs frequently. Therefore Thorington and Thorndon,
like Farringdon and Farndon, were both originally the same name and
destitute alike of _ing_.
As to the names ending in _ing_, with no other suffix, I prefer, for
the present, to reserve my opinion. Kemble’s hypothesis, however, that
they were the parent settlements, and the _hams_ and _tons_ their
filial developments, seems to me to have little support in the facts of
their actual distribution. If in that distribution there is a feature
to be detected, it is, perhaps, that the _ings_ are found along the
foot of the downs. This, at least, is often observable. Another point
deserving of attention is that, in its French form, _igny_, this suffix
seems as distinctive of the ‘Saxon’ settlement about Bayeux as it is
absent in that which is found in the Boulogne district. But these are
only, as it were, sidelights upon the problem; and this, as I said, is
nothing more than a ‘pioneer’ paper.
I close with a point that appears to me of no small importance. To
the east of Sussex and the south of Sussex there lay that so-called
Jutish land, the county of Kent. As I pointed out years ago, in my
‘Domesday Studies,’ the land system of Kent is found in the Great
Survey to be essentially distinct from that which prevailed in other
counties. It was not assessed in ‘hides,’ but in ‘solins,’ that is,
the _sulungs_ of the natives, the land of a _suhl_ or plough. The
yokes, or subdivisions, of this unit are also directly connected
with the plough. But the hide and virgate of other counties are, as
I pointed out, not connected in name with the plough.[46] Now if we
work through the land charters printed by Professor Earle, we find
that this Domesday distinction can be traced back, clear and sharp,
to the earliest times within their ken. We read in an Anglo-Saxon
charter of “xx swuluncga,” while in Latin charters the normal phrase
is the land of so many ploughs (‘terra trium aratrorum,’ ‘terra decem
aratrorum,’ etc.); we even meet with the phrase, “decem aratrorum juxta
æstimationem provinciæ ejusdem.”[47] In another charter “v aratra”
equates “fifsulung landes.” But in other counties the normal terms, in
these charters, for the land units are “manentes” and “cassati,”[48]
which occur with similar regularity. A cleavage so ancient and so clear
as this, in the vital sphere of land division, points to more than a
separate rule and confirms the tradition of a distinct origin.
II
Ingelric the Priest and Albert of Lotharingia
In my paper on “Regenbald, Priest and Chancellor,”[49] I was able
to trace, by combining the evidence of Domesday and of charters,
the history of a “priest” of Edward the Confessor, who became the
“priest” of his successor also, and held of him rich possessions in
churches and lands. Another churchman who flourished both before and
after the Conquest, and must have enjoyed the favour both of the
Confessor and of the Conqueror, was Ingelric, first dean of the house
of St. Martin’s-le-Grand, whose lands had passed before Domesday to
Count Eustace of Boulogne. Mr. Freeman was interested in Ingelric
as a “commissioner for redemption of lands,” but only knew him as a
layman. Nor indeed is there anything in Domesday to suggest that he
was other. To Mr. W. H. Stevenson belongs the credit of proving that
he was a priest by printing “an old English charter of the Conqueror,”
confirming the foundation of St. Martin’s-le-Grand, in which the
“cujusdam fidelis mei Ingelrici scilicet peticioni adquiescens” is
equated by “æfter Ingelrices bene mines preostes.”[50] It was similarly
as “minan preoste” that William had described Regenbald.
The charter I shall now deal with was not known to Mr. Stevenson, and
has not, I believe, been printed. It is of real historical interest,
apart from the fact that among its witnesses we find Ingelric “the
priest.”
Mr. Freeman held that the reconciliation between the Conqueror and
the Abbot of Peterborough--Brand, the Englishman, whose election had
been confirmed, even after the Battle of Hastings, by the ætheling
Eadgar--was one of the earliest events after William’s coronation.[51]
To that episode I do not hesitate to assign a charter entered in the
Peterborough ‘Liber Niger’ belonging to the Society of Antiquaries. It
is a general confirmation of the abbey’s possessions, “petente abbate
Brand,”[52] and is witnessed thus:
Huic testes affuere: Aldredus Eboracensis archiepiscopus;
Wlwinus Lincoliensis episcopus; Merlesuen vicecomes; Ulf filius
Topi; Willelmus comes; Willelmus Malet; Ingelri[cus] presbyter.
Here we have first Ealdred, by whom William had been crowned; then
Wulfwig, bishop of Dorchester, here described as bishop “of Lincoln.”
The mention of Mærleswegen is of special importance, for this great
English noble had been left in charge of the North by Harold on the
eve of the Battle of Hastings, and rose in revolt against William
in the summer of 1068. Here we have evidence of his presence at
William’s court, when his movements were unknown to Mr. Freeman. We
see, moreover, that he was still sheriff (of Lincolnshire). “Ulf
filius Topi,” who appears in other Peterborough charters, had given
“Mannetorp,” Lincolnshire, and other lands to the abbey.
It is very remarkable that the Norman witnesses are only entered after
these Englishmen, although the first is “earl William,” in whom we must
see the Conqueror’s friend, William Fitz Osbern, already, apparently,
earl of Hereford. Sufficient attention has hardly been given to
this early creation or to the selection of so distant a county as
Herefordshire for William’s earldom.
In addition to this charter, there is known to me another, little later
probably, the last witness to which is entered as “Ego Ingelricus ad
hoc impetrandum obnixe studui.” This brings me to the third charter
that I shall deal with in connection with Ingelric. This is the one I
mentioned at the outset as granted by the Conqueror at his request, and
edited with so much care and learning by Mr. W. H. Stevenson. This, in
its stilted, antique form, has much in common with the one preceding,
while its style combines those of the two others. I place the three
together for comparison:
(1) Ego Willelmus dei beneficio rex Anglorum.
(2) jure hereditario Anglorum patrie effectus sum Basileus.
(3) Ego Willelmus Dei dispositione et consanguinitatis
hereditate Anglorum basileus.
Mr. Freeman looked with suspicion on this third charter, which he
termed “an alleged charter of William.”[53] His criticism that, though
dated 1068, its list of witnesses closes with the two papal legates
who visited England in 1070, is a perfectly sound one. Mr. Stevenson
ignored this difficulty in his paper; and, on my pointing it out,
still failed to explain the positive “huic constitutioni interfui”
of Cardinal John. Awkward, however, as the difficulty is, the other
attestations are so satisfactory that we must treat these as subsequent
additions rather than reject the charter.
The remarks which immediately follow are intended only for students
of what is uncouthly known as ‘diplomatic,’ a study hitherto much
neglected in England. In this charter, as printed in Mr. Stevenson’s
paper, there is appended the clause:
Scripta est hec _cartula_ anno ab incarnatione Domini
MLXVIII^o scilicet secundo anno regni mei.
A corresponding clause is found in the old English version of the text
which follows it. But in the Latin text the clause is followed by these
words:
Peracta vero est hec _donacio_[54] die Natali Domini; et
postmodum in die Pentecostes confirmata, quando Mathildis conjux
mea ... in reginam ... est consecrata.
Mr. Freeman somewhat carelessly confused the two clauses:
The charter (_sic_) is said to have been granted at the
Christmas feast of 1068 (evidently meaning 1067), and to have
been confirmed at the coronation of the queen at the following
Pentecost (iv. 726).
Mr. Stevenson follows him in this confusion, but carries it much
further. Speaking of “supplementary confirmations,” as used in
William’s chancery, he writes:
We have one in this very charter, which was executed
(_peracta_) on Christmas Day, 1068 (_i.e._ 1067), but was
afterwards confirmed on the occasion of Matilda’s coronation at
Whitsuntide, 1068. If we had the original charter, we should
probably find that the clause relating to the Whitsuntide
confirmation had been added, as in similar continental
instances, on a blank space in the charter. Ingelric was, as we
know from this grant, one of William’s clerks, and he must have
been a man of considerable influence to have obtained a diploma
from a king who was so chary in the granting of diplomata, and
to have, moreover, obtained the execution of it at so important
a ceremony as the king’s coronation, and a confirmation of it at
the queen’s coronation.[55]
In the elaborate footnotes appended to this passage there are three
points to be dealt with.
The first is “the king’s coronation” as the time when the charter was
executed. Mr. Stevenson writes:
Freeman, Norman Conquest, iv. 724, says that the date of the
charter, Christmas 1068, evidently means 1067, the date of
William’s coronation; etc.... There are good grounds, therefore,
for holding that the witnesses were spectators of William’s
coronation, which gives the charter its greatest historical
importance.[56]
But, as we have seen, it is not the fact that Mr. Freeman spoke of
Christmas 1067 as “the date of William’s coronation.” That event took
place, as all the world knows, at Christmas, 1066, and so was long
previous to this gift and charter. Mr. Stevenson’s error is a strange
one.
The second point is that of the “supplementary confirmation.” Mr.
Stevenson, referring us to the best parallel, writes:
In the case of the council (or rather _placitum_) of 1072
concerning the subjection of York to Canterbury, which, like
the charter under consideration, received a supplementary
ratification, a second text was drawn up for the later action.
I here break off to print, for convenience, the parallel clauses in
these documents side by side.
1068. 1072.
Peracta vero est hec donacio Ventilata est autem hec causa
die Natalis Domini; et postmodum prius apud Wentanam civitatem,
in die Pentecostes confirmata in Paschali solemnitate, in
quando Mathildis conjux capella regia que sita est in
mea in basilica Sancti Petri castello; Windisor, ubi et
Westmonasterii postea in villa finem accepit, in presentia
regia que vocatur in reginam Regis, episcoporum abbatum,
divino nutu est consecrata. diversorum ordinum qui
congregati erant apud curiam in
festivitate Pentecostes.[57]
Resuming now Mr. Stevenson’s note on the documents of 1072, at the
point where I broke it off, we read:
The originals of both still exist. The first, _dated at
Winchester at Whitsuntide_,[58] is validated only by the crosses
of William and his queen, the papal legate, both archbishops and
four bishops (Palæographical Society, i. fol. 170). The second
... is dated at Windsor, also at Whitsuntide, and is attested by
additional bishops, and by numerous abbots.
As the former document (A.2 of the Canterbury charters, apparently
overlooked till some twenty years ago) could not possibly be “dated
at Winchester at Whitsuntide,” one turns to the text as given by the
Palæographical Society, only to find that these words are sheer
imagination on Mr. Stevenson’s part. There is nothing of the kind to be
found there. Owing to this incomprehensible error, he has altogether
misunderstood these “supplementary confirmations.” The clauses I have
printed side by side must not be broken up. The earlier, like the
later, is a consistent whole, added at one time.[59]
When, then, was the “Ingelric” charter actually drawn up? Mr.
Stevenson, following, we have seen, Mr. Freeman’s loose expressions,
tells us that “as the present charter (_sic_) was _peracta_ at
Christmas, 1067, and _confirmata_ at Whitsuntide, it was most probably
written at the former date.” But it was the “donacio,” _not_ the
“charter,” which was “peracta” at Christmas. The text only tells us
of the _charter_ that it was _written_ “anno ab incarnacione Domini
MLXVIII^o.” My own view is that the charter was written not at
Christmas, 1067 (which was the date of the act of gift), but at (or
after) Whitsuntide, 1068. I base this conclusion on the first three
witnesses:
Ego Willelmus rex Anglorum, etc.
Ego Mathildis regina consensum præbui.
Ego Ricardus regis filius annui.
Matilda was not “queen” till Whitsuntide, 1068, and was not even in
England at Christmas, 1067. If it be urged that, even though found
in this position, her name was interpolated afterwards, I reply
that the name of William’s eldest son, Robert, would then have been
similarly added. The fact that we find, instead, his second son,
Richard (afterwards killed while hunting in the New Forest) is to me
the strongest possible evidence that Robert had remained behind, as
regent, in Normandy when his mother came over to England to be crowned.
The most probable date, therefore, for the execution of this charter
is that of her coronation at Westminster, 1068. It preserves for us,
in that case, the names of the magnates present on that occasion,
including Hugh bishop of Lisieux, who may well have escorted her from
Normandy, and thus have attended the ceremony.[60].
My third point follows as a corollary from this conclusion. For if the
charter was drawn up at Whitsuntide, 1068, not at Christmas, 1067,
there is an end of Mr. Stevenson’s argument and conclusion:
The 25th December in the second year of William’s reign was in
1067 according to our reckoning. But the old system of reckoning
the year “ab Incarnatione” began the year on 25th December.
This was the old English system, and this charter proves that
William’s chancery also commenced the year at the Nativity.[61]
The time spent on this important charter has not been wasted. We have
found that one who stands in the front rank of English philologists,
and for whom the same would, doubtless, be claimed in “diplomatic,” may
arrive, in spite of great learning, at quite erroneous conclusions,
simply from inexact treatment of the evidence before him.
A word more on Ingelric. According to Mr. Freeman, “that Ingelric
was an Englishman seems plain.”[62] Mr. Stevenson, however, who has
specially studied the subject of personal names, holds that this was
Frankish. The St. Martin’s charter specially speaks of his having
acquired his lands under Edward the Confessor. Mr. Stevenson, however,
goes further, and states, as we have seen, that it proves him to have
been “one of William’s clerks” (_sic_); and he argues that “if he was
a chancery clerk, he may have continued the traditions of Edward’s
chancery.” It is remarkable, however, that in an Exeter charter (1069)
to which Mr. Stevenson refers us, he again attests, as in two of the
charters dealt with above, as “Ingelricus _presbyter_.” I have chosen,
therefore, for this paper the style “Ingelric the priest.”
* * * * *
No question of origin can arise in the case of a third personage, who
also enjoyed the favour both of Edward and of his successor, namely,
Albert of Lotharingia. Known hitherto as having, it is supposed, given
its name to Lothbury--for the “Terra Alberti Loteringi” is mentioned
in the list of London wards _temp._ Henry I.[63]--he occurs in many
places on the pages of Domesday. As “Albertus Lothariensis” we find
him a tenant-in-chief in the counties of Herefordshire and Beds (186,
216_b_2), one of his manors in the latter county having been held by
him, we read, under Edward the Confessor; and he also occurs by the
same style as holding under the latter king at Hatton, Middlesex
(129). But, so far, there is nothing to show that Albert was a cleric.
It is a Westminster Abbey charter that supplies the missing clue:
Willelmus rex Anglorum Francis et Anglis salutem. Sciatis
me dedisse Sancto Petro Westmonasterii et abbati Gilleberto
ecclesias de Roteland et terras pertinentes ad easdem ecclesias
sicut Albertus Lotharingius de me tenebat ipsas ecclesias cum
omnibus pertinentibus ad ipsas. Teste Hugone de Portu.[64]
Turning to “Roteland” in Domesday, we find that the last name in the
list of its tenants-in-chief is that of “Albertus clericus,” who
holds the churches of Oakham, Hambleton, and St. Peter’s, Stamford,
“cum adjacentibus terris eisdem ecclesiis ... de rege,” the whole
forming a valuable estate. Again, we read under Stamford: “Albertus
unam æcclesiam Sancti Petri cum duabus mansionibus et dimidia carucata
terre quæ jacet in Rotelande in Hemeldune; valet x sol.” (336 _b_).
Following up this clue, we recognise our man in the “Albertus clericus”
who holds at “Eddintone,” in Surrey (30, 36 _b_), and doubtless also
in “Albertus clericus” who held land as an under-tenant at Windsor (56
_b_). Nay, it is difficult to resist the conclusion that he is also the
“Albertus capellanus” who, at the end of the Kent Domesday (14 _b_),
has a page all to himself as tenant-in-chief of Newington. Thus in the
official index to Domesday we find Albert entered under “clericus,”
“Lothariensis,” “Albertus,” and (probably) “capellanus,” and yet, in
each case, it is the same man. Regenbald, exactly in the same way,
is entered under ‘Cirecestre,’ ‘presbyter’ and ‘Reinbaldus.’ In my
‘Feudal England’ I have similarly identified (p. 167) “Eustachius,”
one tenant-in-chief, with “Eustachius vicecomes,” another (and with
“Eustachius,” an under-tenant),[65] and “Oger,” a Northamptonshire
tenant-in-chief, with Oger “Brito,” a Lincolnshire one (p. 220). In the
Eastern counties the Breton founder of the house of Helion is similarly
indexed under ‘Britto’ for Essex, ‘Herion’ for Suffolk, and ‘Tehelus’
for Norfolk. Small as these points may seem, their ultimate consequence
is great, for they still further reduce the number of tenants-in-chief.
When the history of these magnates is more fully known, it will
probably be found that those who held _in capite per servitium
militare_, thus excluding, of course, mere serjeants, etc., were a mere
handful compared with the vast total given by Ellis and others.
Albert’s Lotharingian origin becomes of special interest now that we
know he was a cleric, for Mr. Freeman devoted a special appendix to
“Lotharingian churchmen under Edward.”[66] Unfortunately he was not
acquainted with the case of Albert. Dr. Stubbs also has dwelt on the
importance, for the church, of “the increased intercourse with the
empire, and especially with Lorraine,” under Edward the Confessor.[67]
He alludes, without committing himself to it, to Mr. Freeman’s somewhat
fanciful theory on the subject.
III
Anglo-Norman Warfare
Having devoted special study to the art of war in the Norman period,
including therein the subject of castles, I may have, perhaps, some
claim to deal with the latest work on a topic which requires for
its treatment special knowledge. When a treatise assumes a definite
character, and is likely to be permanently consulted, it calls for
closer criticism than a mere ephemeral production, and on this ground
I would here discuss some points in Mr. Oman’s ‘History of the Art of
War’ (1898).
Mr. Oman issued, so far back as 1885, ‘The Art of War in the Middle
Ages,’ so that he enjoys, on this subject, the advantage of prolonged
study. In 1894 he contributed to ‘Social England’[68] an article on
“Norman Warfare,” to which I shall also refer. I should add that in his
first (1885), as in his later work (1898), Mr. Oman received the help
of Mr. F. York Powell, now Regius Professor of Modern History at Oxford.
The first point I propose to consider is that of the famous English
“formation” before the Norman Conquest. Mr. Oman originally wrote as
follows:
The tactics of the English axemen were those of the column;
arranged in a compact mass, they could beat off almost any
attack, and hew their way through every obstacle (‘Art of War,’
p. 24).
This was also the view of the late Professor Freeman, who wrote of the
battle of Maldon that--
The English stood, as at Senlac, in the array common to them
and their enemies--a strong line, or rather wedge of infantry,
forming a wall with their shields.
At the battle of Hastings (“Senlac”) itself he tells us--
The English clave to the old Teutonic tactics. They fought on
foot in the close array of the shield wall.
They were ranged, he held, “closely together in the thick array of
the shield wall.” He had well observed that “the Norman writers
were specially struck with the close array of the English,” and had
elsewhere spoken of “the close array of the battle-axe men,” and of
“the English house-carls with their ... huge battle axes,” accustomed
to fight in “the close array of the shield wall.”[69]
To this formation, it is necessary to observe, the term _testudo_
was applied. At the battle of Ashdown, Freeman wrote:
Asser calls it a _testudo_ or tortoise. This is the shield
wall, the famous tactic of the English and Danes. We shall hear
of it in all the great battles down to the end.
Florence adopts the same word in describing the formation of the rival
hosts on that occasion:
Pagani in duas se turmas dividentes, æquali _testudine_
bellum parant (i. 83).
Ælfred ... Christianas copias contra hostiles exercitus ...
dirigens ... _testudine_ ordinabiliter condensata (i. 84).
So, too, at the battle of Ethandun:
Ubi contra Paganorum exercitum universum cum densa
_testudine_ atrociter belligerans (i. 96).
Again, in 1052:
Pedestris exercitus ... spissam terribilemque fecit
_testudinem_.
This is an exact description of the host that faced the Normans,
fourteen years later, on the hill of Battle. As William of Malmesbury
describes it:
Pedites omnes cum bipennibus, conserta ante se _scutorum
testudine_, impenetrabilem cuneum faciunt.[70]
“It is a pleasure,” as I wrote, “to find myself here in complete
agreement with Mr. Freeman.”[71] Mr. Freeman saw in this passage “the
array of the shield wall,”[72] and aptly compared Abbot Æthelred’s
description of the English array at the Battle of the Standard:
“Scutis scuta junguntur, lateribus latera conseruntur.”[73] With Mr.
Oman also I was no less pleased to find myself in perfect agreement.
I myself should speak, as he does, of the “tactics of the phalanx of
axemen.”[74] It is particularly interesting to read in his latest work
(p. 57), that at Zülpich (A.D. 612), according to Fredegarius:
So great was the press when the hostile masses [_phalanges_]
met and strove against each other, that the bodies of the slain
could not fall to the ground, but the dead stood upright wedged
among the living.
For precisely the same phenomenon is described at the Battle of
Hastings. William of Poitiers says of the English:
Ob nimiam densitatem eorum labi vix potuerunt interfecti.
And Bishop Guy:
Spiritibus nequeunt frustrata cadavera sterni,
Nec cedunt vivis corpora militibus.
Omne cadaver enim, vita licet evacuatum,
Stat velut illæsum, possidet atque locum.[75]
There is nothing strange in this parallel between Zülpich and Hastings,
for Mr. Oman observes that:
In their weapons and their manner of fighting, the bands of
Angles, Jutes, and Saxons who overran Britain were more nearly
similar to the Franks than to the German tribes who wandered
south.[76]
At Poictiers “the Franks fought, as they had done two hundred years
before at Casilinum, in one solid mass,”[77] for their tactics were “to
advance in a deep column or wedge.”[78] We have seen that the “column”
of English axemen similarly fought, according to Mr. Oman, “arranged in
a compact mass.”
Where the agreement is so complete, I need not labour the point
further. In my ‘Feudal England’ (pp. 354–8), I showed that Mr.
Archer’s views on the subject could not stand for a moment against
those of Mr. Freeman and Mr. Oman, to which they were directly opposed.
In ‘Social England’--just as Mr. Freeman had written that both the
English and the Danes stood as a “wedge of infantry forming a wall with
their shields”[79]--Mr. Oman writes of their “wedge or column.” It is
only in his later work that he suddenly shifts his ground, and flatly
contradicts his own words:
1894. 1898.
When Dane had fought Englishman, The Danes ... formed their
the battle had always shield wall.... The shield
been between _serried bodies_ wall (testudo, as Asser
[80] of foot soldiery, meeting pedantically calls it) is _of
fairly face to face _in the course not a wedged mass_,[80]
wedge_ or column, with its but only a line of shielded
shield wall of warriors warriors[81] (History of the
standing elbow to elbow, etc. Art of War,’ p. 99).
(‘Social England,’ p. 299).
The writer’s “of course” is delightful.
* * * * *
This contradiction of himself, however, is as nothing compared with
that to which we are now coming.
In his first work Mr. Oman wrote under Mr. Freeman’s influence. The
Normans, he held, at the Battle of Hastings, were confronted by
“impregnable palisades.” Nine years later, in his second description
of the battle, he substituted for these “impregnable palisades” an
“impenetrable shield wall.”
1885. 1894.
The Norman knights, if unsupported His archers, if unsupported by
by their light infantry, cavalry, might have been driven
_might have surged for ever around off the field by a single
the_ IMPREGNABLE PALISADES. charge; his cavalry, if
The archers, if unsupported by unsupported by archers, _might
the knights, could easily have have surged for ever around
been DRIVEN OFF THE FIELD BY A the_ IMPENETRABLE SHIELD WALL
GENERAL charge. United, however, of the English. But by
by the skilled tactics of William, combining the two armies
the two divisions of the invading (_sic_) with perfect skill, he
army won the day (‘Art of War,’ won his crowning victory
p. 25). (‘Social England,’p. 299).
The faithful _réchauffé_ of his former narrative only renders the
more significant Mr. Oman’s change of “impregnable palisades” to
“impenetrable shield wall.” For what had happened in the meanwhile to
account for this change being made? In July, 1892, there had appeared
in the ‘Quarterly Review’ my well-known article on “Professor Freeman,”
in which I had maintained that the English defence consisted, _not_ of
impregnable “palisades,” but only of an impenetrable “shield wall.” On
the furious and famous controversy upon this topic which followed, it
is quite unnecessary to dwell. Mr. Oman, we have seen himself adopted
the view I had advanced, and not, I hasten to add, on this point alone,
for with his whole description of the battle, as given in ‘Social
England,’ I am in complete agreement. The “shield wall” he mentions
twice.[82] Of “palisades,” intrenchments, or breastworks there is not a
word.
And yet Mr. Oman, now, is not ashamed to write:
I fear that I must plead that I was never converted. This being
so, Mr. Round cannot prove that I was.[83]
What is the explanation of Mr. Oman’s statement? Simply that he has
again changed his view; and having first adopted that of Mr. Freeman,
and then abandoned it to adopt my own, he now, in turn, abandons
both, and advances a third (or fourth) at variance with both alike!
His Norman knights are still “surging”; but they “surge” against an
obstacle which has once more changed its character:
The knights, if unsupported by the bowmen, might have surged for
ever against the _impregnable breastworks_. The archers,
unsupported by the knights, could easily have been driven off
the field by a general charge. United by the skilful hand of
William, they were invincible (‘History of the Art of War,’ p.
164).
What then were these “impregnable breastworks” which now make their
appearance in our old familiar passage? They are described on page 154,
where we read that “we must not think ... of massive palisading:[84]
they were merely
wattled hurdles ... intended, perhaps, more as a cover against
missiles than as a solid protection against the horsemen, for
they can have been but hastily constructed things, put together
in a few hours by wearied men.”
Let us place, side by side, Mr. Oman’s own words in this his latest
work:
The knights, if unsupported by [The English defences]
the bowmen, might have constituted no impregnable
surged for ever against the fortress, but a slight
impregnable breastworks (p. 164). earthwork, not wholly impassable
to horsemen (p. 154).
That they were, to say the least, “not wholly impassable” is evident
from the writer’s own description (p. 159) of the Norman knights’ first
charge “against the long front of the breastworks, which, in many
places, they must have swept down by their mere impetus.” Nay, “before
the two armies met hand to hand,” as Mr. Freeman observes,[85] a single
horseman--“a minstrel named Taillefer,” as Mr. Oman terms him--“burst
right through the breastwork and into the English line” (p. 158).[86]
Such, on Mr. Oman’s own showing, were his so-called “impregnable
breastworks” (p. 164). A single horseman could ride through them!
We see then that, in this his latest work, he not only adopts yet
another view, but cannot adopt it consistently even when he does.
To me there is nothing strange in all this shift and shuffle. It has
distinguished each of my opponents on this subject from the first.
Not only are they all at variance with one another: they are also
at variance with themselves. Alone my own theory remains unchanged
throughout. The English faced their foes that day in “the close array
of the shield wall.” Other defences they had none.
Mr. Oman has actually advanced four theories in succession:
(1) “The impregnable palisades.”[87]
(2) “The impenetrable shield wall.”[88]
(3) “An _abattis_ of some sort.”[89]
(4) “Wattled hurdles.”[90]
The third of these made its appearance after his description in ‘Social
England.’ “I still hold,” Mr. Oman wrote, “to the belief that there was
an _abattis_ of some sort in front of Harold’s line.”
But how can he “still” hold to a belief which he has never expressed
before or since? For neither the first, second, or fourth of the
defences he gives above can by any possibility describe an _abattis_.
The New English Dictionary describes an _abattis_ as
a defence constructed by placing felled trees lengthwise, one
over the other, with their branches towards the enemy’s line.
The ‘Encyclopædia Britannica’ gives us a similar description, speaking
of this defence as constructed of “felled trees lengthwise ... the
stems inwards.”[91] One is driven to suppose that Mr. Oman is quite
unable to understand what an _abattis_ really is.
We have now seen that the writer has actually given in succession four
entirely different descriptions of the defences of the English front,
while he has not the candour to confess that he has ever changed his
mind.
At this I am not in the least surprised. As I have observed in ‘Feudal
England,’ p. 342:
As for the defenders of the ‘palisade,’ they cannot even agree
among themselves as to what it really was. Mr. Archer produces
a new explanation only to throw it over almost as soon as it is
produced. One seeks to know for certain what one is expected to
deal with; but, so far as it is possible to learn, nobody can
tell one. There is only a succession of dissolving views, and
one is left to deal with a nebulous hypothesis.
Even since these words were published, Mr. Oman has produced his fourth
explanation, and has produced it in conjunction with Mr. Archer, who
had previously enriched this series of explanations by two further
ones of his own. In one of them the “fenestres,” which Wace makes
the principal ingredient of the palisade, are rendered by Mr. Archer
“windows.”[92] In another he describes the English defence as “a
structure of interwoven shields and stakes,” “shields set in the ground
and supported by a palisade of stakes,” a defence into which “actual
shields have been built.”[93] It is only necessary to add that Mr.
Oman, who acknowledges here his “indebtedness to Mr. T. A. Archer,”[94]
tacitly, but absolutely, rejects both these phantasies, together with
Mr. Archer’s great theory that the English axemen were “shieldless” at
the battle,[95] and “could not or did not form the shield wall.”[96]
All this Mr. Oman rejects, though, of course, he is careful not to say
so; just as Mr. Archer, before him, had rejected views of Mr. Freeman,
while professing to defend his account of the battle against me.[97]
* * * * *
I have now shown that my opponents are still as unable as ever to agree
among themselves on the subject of the alleged English defence, and
that as to Mr. Oman, he contradicts himself, not only in successive
works, but even in a single chapter. A little _clique_ of Oxford
historians, mortified at my crushing _exposé_ of Mr. Freeman’s
vaunted accuracy, have endeavoured, without scruple, and with almost
unconcealed anger, to silence me at any cost. And they cannot even wait
until they have agreed among themselves.
How entirely impotent they are to stay the progress of the truth
is shown by the fact that a German writer, Dr. Spatz, who has
independently examined the authorities and the ground, goes even
farther than myself in rejecting Mr. Freeman’s narrative, and
especially the palisade.[98] Sir James Ramsay also, on similarly
independent investigation, has been driven to the same conclusion,
which his recently published work embodies. Does Mr. Oman refer to Dr.
Spatz, whose work is a well-known one? No, he coolly states that “the
whole balance of learned opinion” is against me on this matter,[99]
although, as we have seen, neither he nor Mr. Archer accepts Mr.
Freeman’s narrative,[100] while their own recorded views hopelessly
differ (see pp. 43, 49).
Again, Mr. Oman writes:
I do not see what should have induced him [Wace] to bring the
wattled barrier into his narrative, unless it existed in the
tale of the fight as it had been told him, etc. (p. 153).
And yet he made use of my ‘Feudal England,’ in which I set forth
prominently (pp. 409–416), as I had previously done in the ‘English
Historical Review’ (viii. 677 _et seq._; ix. 237), my theory that the
passage in Wace “is nothing but a metrical, elaborate, and somewhat
confused paraphrase of the words of William of Malmesbury,” and that
he was clearly misled by the words “conserta ... testudine,” which
he did not understand. Mr. Archer discussed this theory, but did not
venture to reject it (Ibid.). Mr. Oman finds it safer to ignore it, and
to profess that he cannot imagine where Wace got the idea from, except
from oral tradition.
It is the same with the arrangement of the English host. In his latest
work, Mr. Oman states, as a matter of fact, that the “house carles”
formed the centre, and that
the fyrd, divided no doubt according to its shires, was ranged
on either flank (p. 155).
There is no authority whatever for this view in any account of the
battle, and it is wholly at variance with Mr. Oman’s own view, as
stated in his earlier works.
Backed (_sic_) by the disorderly There the house carles of King
masses of the fyrd, and by the Harold, backed (_sic_) by the
thegns of the home counties, thegnhood of all southern
the house carles of King Harold England and the disorderly
stood (‘Art of War,’ p. 24). masses of the fyrd of the home
counties, drew themselves out
(‘Social England,’ p. 229).
In perfect agreement with these passages, I hold that “the well-armed
house carles,” as Mr. Oman terms them, formed the English front, and
were “backed” by the rest of the host.[101] Mr. Oman’s later view
involves a tactical absurdity, as I have maintained throughout.[102]
But here again Mr. Oman finds it the safest plan to ignore an argument
he cannot face.
Let me, however, part from his narrative of the great struggle with
an expression of honest satisfaction that, even in his latest work,
he treats “the English host” as ranged “in one great solid mass”
(p. 154). This is the essential point on which I have insisted
throughout.[103] “No feature of the great battle is more absolutely
beyond dispute”;[104] and it absolutely cuts the ground from under Mr.
Archer’s feet.[105]
I may add that the denseness of the English host is similarly grasped
by Sir James Ramsay, who has made an independent examination of the
battle, and has set forth his interesting and original conclusions in
his recently-published ‘Foundations of England.’ The ground plan of
the battle in his work should be carefully compared with that which is
found in Mr. Freeman’s History. For the two differ so hopelessly that
the wholly conjectural character of Mr. Freeman’s views on the matter
will at once be vividly shown. The bold conclusion of Sir James Ramsay
that the English host held only the little plateau at the summit of the
Battle hill, is at least in harmony with their dense array, and is very
possibly correct.[106]
* * * * *
I now turn from battles to castles--those castles which played so
prominent a part in Anglo-Norman warfare.
Let us first glance at the moated mound, and then at the rectangular
keep. I do not desire, on the moated mound, to commit myself to all
Mr. Clark’s views; but practical archæologists, I need scarcely say,
are aware that the outer works of these most interesting strongholds
were normally of horseshoe or crescent form, the mound being “placed
on one side of an appended area.”[107] Mr. Oman, while acknowledging
in his book, and in the columns of the ‘Athenæum,’ his indebtedness
to Mr. Clark’s “admirable account of the topographical details of
English castles,” describes the old English burhs as “stake and foss
in concentric rings enclosing water-girt mounds” (p. 111). I pointed
out in the ‘Athenæum’[108] that “Mr. Clark, who did more than any one
for our knowledge of these burhs, was careful to explain,” in his
plans,[109] that their outer defences were not concentric, as Mr. Oman
asserts.
Determined never to admit a mistake, Mr. Oman retorted:
Of course, I am quite aware that in many burhs the outer works
are not purely concentric; but the concentric form is the more
typical. An admirable example of such a stronghold may be
seen on p. 21 of Mr. Clark’s book, where he gives the plan of
Edward’s burh of Towcester built in 921.[110]
Yet, in dealing with the Norman shell keeps on these “old palisaded
mounds,” Mr. Oman actually, in his own book, admits, of their “outer
defences,” that
as a general rule, the keep lies _not in the middle of the
space_, but at one end of it, or set in the walls ... as a
general rule the keep stands at one end of the enclosed space,
_not in its midst_.[111]
This is the feature of these striking works for which I myself
contended, and which, on that account, Mr. Oman at once denied.
As to the Towcester burh, I will place side by side my criticism and
Mr. Oman’s reply:
MR. ROUND. MR. OMAN.
A comparison of the plan on p. 21 He states that Towcester
with those on pp. 24, 25 will show burh, as drawn on p. 21 of Mr.
at once that the former is that of Clark’s Mediæval Military
the “water-girt mound” (as Mr. Architecture, is ‘a water-girt
Oman terms it) alone, and contains mound alone, with no outer
no “outer works,” concentric or works, concentric or other.’...
other.[112] Apparently Mr. Round cannot
read the simplest military
sketch; in this map there are
clear indications of outer
lines other than the mere
water.... In short, Mr. Round
is writing nonsense, and I
strongly suspect that he
knows it.[113]
Any archæologist comparing the plans will see at once that my statement
is correct, and that the plan (compare the section) shows absolutely
nothing beyond the actual ditch of the mound. I offered to submit the
question to Mr. St. John Hope’s decision,[114] but Mr. Oman would
submit it to no one but his friend and coadjutor, Mr. York Powell, who
is not known as an authority on these works, and who is hostile to
myself because I exposed Mr. Freeman![115]
Having now shown that, in his own words, Mr. Oman “cannot read the
simplest military sketch,” I pass to the siege of Rochester Castle,
famous for its rectangular keep, in 1264. This was an event that
deserves attention in a ‘History of the Art of War,’ for John had
breached the keep by mining half a century before, and the stately
structure had now to stand an energetic siege at the hands of Simon de
Montfort. A striking passage in Rishanger’s Chronicle tells us that,
advancing from London,
comes autem de Leycestria, vir in omnibus circumspectus,
machinas et alia ad expugnationem castri necessaria secum a
civitate Londoniarum per aquam et per terram transvehi præcepit,
quibus inclusos vehementer impugnavit, nec eos indulgere quieti
permisit; exemplum relinquens Anglicis qualiter circa castrorum
assultationes agendum sit qui penitus hujusmodi diebus illis
fuerant ignari.[116]
The barons promptly stormed the ‘outer bailey’ of the castle (April
19),[117] and strove desperately to gain the keep, till, a week later,
they fled suddenly at the news of the king’s advance on London.[118]
But so vigorous were the siege operations by attack, battery, and
mining, that they were on the point of succeeding when they had to
raise the siege.[119]
Surely a ‘History of the Art of War’ should mention the above
remarkable allusion to Simon’s mastery of siege operations, and to his
teaching the English, who were then ignorant of the subject. But all
that Mr. Oman tells us is that--
the massive strength of Gundulf’s Norman keep was too much for
such siege appliances as the earl could employ. The garrison
under John de Warenne, the Earl of Surrey, held their own
without difficulty (p. 416).
We have seen that, on the contrary, the keep was on the point of
being taken. But what are we to say to the words, “_Gundulf’s_ Norman
keep”? “It was long the custom,” as Mr. Clark wrote, “to attribute this
keep to Gundulf, making it contemporaneous, or nearly so, with the
Tower of London”; but, more than thirty years ago, it was shown by Mr.
Hartshorne (in the ‘Archæological Journal’) that it was built in later
days under William of Corbeuil (1126–1136).[120] No one, in the present
state of our knowledge, could suppose that Gundulf was its builder; and
it is obvious that a writer who does must have yet everything to learn
on Norman military architecture.
* * * * *
I must lastly deal as briefly as possible with the subject of knight
service. The view of modern historians has been that this was gradually
evolved during the Norman period out of a pre-conquestual obligation
to provide one armed man for every five hides held. As against this I
have advanced the theory[121] that the whole arrangement was introduced
_de novo_ at the Conquest, when the Conqueror assessed the fiefs he
granted in terms of _the five-knight unit irrespective of hidation_.
Put in a less technical form my theory is that the Conqueror called
on the holder of every considerable fief to furnish a contingent of
five knights, or some multiple of five, to the feudal host.[122] And
this he did arbitrarily, without reckoning the ‘hides’ that might be
contained in the fief. Further, by the _argumentum ad absurdum_, I
showed that if every five hides had to provide a knight, there would be
nothing, or less than nothing, left for the tenant-in-chief.[123] It
was of this new theory that Professors Pollock and Maitland observe, in
their history of English Law (i. 238–9), that they regard it “as having
been proved by Mr. Round’s convincing papers.”
Mr. Oman, however, leans to the now exploded theory, and holds that
under Norman rule “the old notion that the five hides must provide
a fully armed man was remembered;”[124] and that though “some lay
tenants-in-chief” got off easily, “the majority were obliged to supply
their proper contingent.”[125] He then proceeds:
It has been clearly shown of late, by an eminent inquirer into
early English antiquities, that the hidage of the townships was
very roughly assessed, and that the compilers of Domesday Book
incline towards round numbers.
Now apart from the fact that this “eminent inquirer,” my friend
Professor Maitland to wit, gives me full credit for having been first
in the field[126]--a fact which Mr. Oman, with my book before him, of
course carefully ignores--his words show that he cannot understand the
simplest historical theory. Professor Maitland and I have dwelt on the
antiquity of this assessment, with which “the compilers of Domesday
Book” had no more to do than Mr. Oman himself, and which indeed the
compilation of that book has almost utterly obscured.
From the fact of the five-hide unit Mr. Oman argues “that there was
little difficulty in apportioning the military service due from the
tenants-in-chief who owned them,”[127] though such apportionment, as I
have shown, would result in an actual absurdity.[128] Indeed, Mr. Oman
himself observes that the tenant-in-chief, to discharge his obligation,
“might distribute the bulk of his estate in lots roughly averaging five
hides to subtenants, who would discharge the service for him,”[129]
although a moment’s consideration will show that this process would
absorb not “the bulk,” but the whole of his estate.
But all this is insignificant by the side of Mr. Oman’s double error
on the _vetus feoffamentum_. This begins on p. 359, which is headed
“The old enfeoffment,’” and which describes the distribution of fiefs
by William among the tenants-in-chief. On the next page he writes of
“the knights of ‘the old enfeoffment,’ as William’s arrangement was
entitled,” and proceeds to vouch my ‘Feudal England’ as his authority
for this statement! On the same page we read of the landholder’s
“_servitium debitum_ according to the assessment of the _vetus
feoffamentum_ of the Conqueror”; and further learn that Henry II.
demanded a statement as to the number of knights whom each
tenant-in-chief owed as subtenants, how many were under the
‘old enfeoffment’ of William I., and how many of more recent
establishment.
We also read that--
the importance of King Henry’s inquest of 1166 was twofold. It
not only gave him the information that he required as to the
proper maintenance of the _debitum servitium_ due under the
‘old enfeoffment’ of the Conqueror, but showed him how many more
knights had been planted out (_sic_) since that assessment
(p. 363).
Again, on page 364 we read of “the ‘old enfeoffment’ of the eleventh
century,” and the phrase (which Mr. Oman quite properly places within
quotation marks) occurs in at least three other passages.
It is quite evident that Mr. Oman imagines the _vetus feoffamentum_
to be (1) the original distribution by the Conqueror (2) among the
tenants-in-chief. Both ideas are absolutely wrong. For (1) it had
nothing to do with “William’s arrangement”--which determined the
_servitium debitum_, a very different matter; and (2) it referred to
the _sub_-enfeoffment of knights by tenants-in-chief. The dividing
line between the “old” and the “new” feoffments, was the death of
Henry I. in 1135. All fees existing at that date were of the _antiquum
feoffamentum_; all fees created subsequently were of the _novum
feoffamentum_. This essential date is nowhere given by Mr. Oman,
who evidently imagined that the latter were those “of more recent
establishment” than “the old enfeoffment of William I.”
The frightful confusion into which Mr. Oman has been led by his double
blunder is shown by his own selected instance, the _carta_ of Roger de
Berkeley in 1166. According to him, “Roger de Berkeley owed (_sic_) two
knights and a half on the old enfeoffment.”[130] Two distinct things
are here hopelessly confused.
(1) Roger “owed” a _servitium debitum_ (not of 2½, but) of 7½
knights to the Crown; and his fief paid scutage[131] accordingly in
1168, 1172, and 1190.
(2) Roger “has” two and a half knights enfeoffed under the old
feoffment[132] (that is, whose fiefs existed in 1135), the balance
of his _servitium debitum_ being, therefore, chargeable on his
demesne,[133] as no knights had been enfeoffed since 1135.
It is difficult to understand how the writer can have erred so
grievously, for it was fully recognised by Dr. Stubbs and by myself
(‘Feudal England,’ pp. 237–239) that 1135 was the dividing point.[134]
It may be as well to impress on antiquaries that fees “de antiquo
feoffamento” were fees which had been in existence in 1135, at the
death of Henry I., just as tenures, in Domesday Book, ‘T.R.E.,’ were
those which had existed in 1066, at the death of Edward; for with these
two formulas they will frequently meet. It is the “servitium debitum,”
not the “antiquum feoffamentum,” which “runs back,” as Mr. Oman
expresses it, to the Conquest.
The result of his confusion is that his account of the origins (in
England) of knight service is not only gravely erroneous, but curiously
topsy-turvy. This is scarcely wonderful when we find on page 365 that
he is hopelessly confused about knights and serjeants, not having
grasped the elementary distinction between tenure by serjeanty and
tenure by knight service. From what I have seen of the author’s
account of the battle of Bannockburn, his errors, I imagine, are by
no means restricted to the subjects I have here discussed. A curious
combination of confidence and unwillingness to admit his mistakes, with
a haste or confusion of thought that leads him into grievous error,
is responsible, it would seem, for those misconceptions which render
untrustworthy, as it stands, his ‘History of the Art of War.’
IV
The Origin of the Exchequer
Historians have rivalled one another in their witness to the
extraordinary interest and importance of the twelfth-century Exchequer.
“The whole framework of society,” writes the Bishop of Oxford, “may be
said to have passed annually under its review.... The regular action
of the central power of the kingdom becomes known to us first in
the proceedings of the Exchequer.” Gneist insists on “its paramount
importance” while “finance is the centre of all government”; and in
her brilliant monograph on Henry the Second, Mrs. Green asserts “that
the study of the Exchequer is in effect the key to English history at
this time.... It was the fount of English law and English freedom.”
One can, therefore, understand Mr. Hall’s enthusiasm for “the most
characteristic of all our national institutions ... the stock from
which the several branches of the administration originally sprang.”
Nor does this study appeal to us only on account of its importance.
A glamour, picturesque, sentimental it may be, and yet dazzling in
its splendour, surrounds an institution possessing so immemorial an
antiquity that “Barons of the Exchequer” meet us alike in the days
of our Norman kings and in those of Queen Victoria. Its “tellers,”
at least coeval with the Conquest, were only finally abolished some
sixty years ago, while the Chancellor of the Exchequer is believed to
represent that “clericus cancellarii” whose seat at the Exchequer of
the second Henry was close to that of the official ancestor of the
present secretary to the Treasury. Yet, older than these, older even
than the very name of the Exchequer, was its wondrous system of wooden
tallies, that hieroglyphic method of account which carries us back to a
distant past, but which, Sir John Lubbock has observed, was “actually
in use at the Exchequer until the year 1824.” Of all survivals of an
archaic age this was, probably, the most marvellous; it is not easy
to realize that even in the present century English officials were
keeping their accounts with pieces of wood which “had attained the
dimensions, and presented somewhat the appearance, of one of the wooden
swords of the South Sea Islanders.” It was an almost tragic feature
in the passing of “the old order” that when these antique relics were
finally committed to the flames, there perished, in the conflagration
said to have been thus caused, that Palace of Parliament which, like
themselves, had lingered on to witness the birth of the era of Reform.
But what, it may be asked, was the Exchequer, and why was it so named?
The earliest answer, it would seem, is that of William Fitz Stephen,
who, in his biography of Becket, tells us that, in 1164, John the
Marshal was in London, officially engaged “at the quadrangular table,
which, from its counters (_calculis_) of two colours, is commonly
called the Exchequer (_scaccarium_), but which is rather the king’s
table for white money (_nummis albicoloribus_), where also are held
the king’s pleas of the Crown.”[135] The passage is not particularly
clear, but I quote it because it is not, I believe, mentioned by Mr.
Hall,[136] and because William Fitz Stephen knew his London well. The
questions I have asked above are those which avowedly are answered in
the first chapter of the famous ‘Dialogus de Scaccario’ (_circ._ 1178).
I need not, however, repeat in detail the explanations there given,
for they should be familiar from the works of Dr. Stubbs and of every
writer on the subject. Suffice it to say that while, in shape, the
‘Exchequer’, with its ledge, as Mr. Hall observes, was not unlike a
billiard table, “it derived its name from the chequered cloth” which,
says Dr. Stubbs, covered it, and which gave it a resemblance to a
chess board (_scaccarium_). Antiquaries have questioned this, as they
will question everything; but the fact remains that the symbol of the
Exchequer, of which types have been depicted by Mr. Hall, is that which
swings and creaks before the wayside ‘chequers,’ which once, in azure
and gold, blazed upon the hill of Lewes, and which still is proudly
quartered by the Earl Marshal of England.
In the present paper I propose to consider the origin and development
of the institution, and to examine critically some of the statements in
the famous ‘Dialogus de Scaccario,’ of which the authority has hitherto
been accepted almost without question.
It is alleged that a cruel hoax was perpetrated on the Royal Society by
that ‘merry monarch’ Charles II., who called on its members to account
for a phenomenon which existed only in his own imagination. Antiquaries
and historians have, with similar success, been hoaxed by Richard the
son of Nigel, who stated as a fact in his ‘Dialogue on the Exchequer,’
that there is no mention of a ‘blanch’ ferm to be found in Domesday
Book. Richard proceeded to infer from this that those who spoke of
‘blanch’ ferm existing before the Conquest must be mistaken.[137]
Dr. Stubbs actually accepts the statement that “the blanch-ferm is not
mentioned in Domesday,” but declares that Stapleton, in his well-known
argument,[138] has clearly shown it to have had “its origin in a
state of things that did not exist in Normandy, and was ‘consequent
upon the monetary system of the Anglo-Saxons.’ The argument,” he
writes, “is very technical, but quite conclusive.” Sir James Ramsay
also, though writing as a specialist on finance, contents himself
with citing Stapleton, through Stubbs, and with adding a reference to
“white silver” in the Laws of Ælfred,[139] and ignores the evidence in
Domesday Book.
Now the index to the Government edition of Domesday is a very
imperfect production, but we need travel no farther than its pages to
discover that there is no difficulty to solve; for the “alba firma” is
duly entered under an Isle of Wight manor (i. 39 _b_). Moreover,
we read on the same folio of “lx solidos albos” and “xii libras
blancas” in a way that suggests the identity of the two descriptions.
But, further, we find, scattered over Domesday, ‘Libræ albæ,’ ‘blancæ,’
and ‘candidæ,’ together with ‘libræ de albis denariis’ or ‘de candidis
denariis,’ and ‘libræ alborum nummorum’ or ‘candidorum nummorum.’ The
‘blanch’ system, therefore, was already quite familiar. This, however,
is not all. On the folio mentioned above (i. 39 _b_) we read of
another manor: “T. R. E. xxv lib. ad pensum et arsuram.” This can only
refer to that payment in weighed and assayed money, the method of which
is described in the ‘Dialogue’ under ‘Quid ad militem argentarium’ and
‘Quid ad fusorem’ (I. vi.). All this elaborate system, therefore, must
have been already in operation before the Conquest.
But the ‘Dialogue’ asserts in its next and very remarkable chapter--“A
quibus vel ad quid instituta fuerit argenti examinatio”--that this
system was first introduced by the famous Roger, bishop of Salisbury,
the writer’s great-uncle, after he had sat at the Exchequer for some
years, and had discovered the need of introducing it.[140] Between
this statement and the evidence of Domesday the contradiction is so
absolute that a grave question at once arises as to the value of the
writer’s assertions on the early Norman period. Like the men of his
time, he revelled in texts, and loved to drag them in on every possible
occasion. One is, therefore, only following his example in suggesting
that his guiding principle was, “I magnify my office.” The greatness
and the privileges of a seat at the Exchequer were ever present in his
mind. But to this he added another principle, for which insufficient
allowance, perhaps, has hitherto been made. And this was, ‘I magnify
my house.’ Nor can one blame the worthy treasurer for dwelling on his
family’s achievements and exalting his father and his great-uncle as
the true pillars of the Exchequer. He was perfectly justified in doing
this; but historians should have been on their guard when he claims for
Bishop Roger the introduction of a system which Domesday Book shows us
as already in general operation.[141]
Enlightened by this discovery, we can more hardily approach a statement
by the writer in the same chapter, which has been very widely repeated.
One need only mention its acceptance by such specialists as Stapleton,
in his work on the Norman Exchequer, and Mr. Hubert Hall, who, in his
work on the ‘Antiquities and Curiosities of the Exchequer,’ refers to
it four times.[142] He first tells us that
for half a century after the Conquest there could have been very
little need of a central treasury at all, since the greater part
of these provisions formed an intrinsic portion of the revenue
itself ... which was still payable in kind. This point is both
important and interesting, and has been hitherto somewhat
overlooked by economic writers. The fact (which is probable
enough in itself) rests on high authority--that of the famous
treasurer of the first two Plantagenet kings (p. 4).
Again, he writes on p. 161:
We have seen that in the earliest times--previously, that is, to
the reorganization of the Exchequer under Henry I.--the revenue
of the sovereign was answered in two forms, namely, in specie
and in kind, the former drawn from judicial fines and farms of
towns, and the latter rendered, at an arbitrary assessment, by
the cultivators of the royal demensne.[143]
The passage itself in the ‘Dialogus,’ which Mr. Hall translates _in
extenso_ (pp. 180–182), requires careful examination. The “high
authority” of which he speaks proves to be, in fact, only tradition,
for the opening words of the passage run: “Sicut traditum est a
patribus.” Now one would not strain unduly the words of the Dialogue’s
author, but his meaning may be fairly understood to be that the rents
of the royal demesne were not only paid in kind (for that he clearly
asserts), but were also valued in kind alone. For he thus describes the
change introduced under Henry I.:
Destinavit [rex] per regnum quos ad id prudentiores et
discretiores cognoverat, qui circueuntes et oculata fide fundos
singulos perlustrantes, habita æstimatione victualium, quæ de
hiis solvebantur, redegerunt in summam denariorum.
This can only imply the substitution of a money valuation for a rent
payable in kind. And yet we have to go no further than this very
chapter to learn that these rents had previously been reckoned in
money (not in kind). For if, as stated in the note below, they had,
when they were paid in kind, to be reduced by the king’s officers to a
money standard, it could only be because their amounts were due, not
in kind, but in money.[144] Fortunately, however, we are not dependent
on this obvious contradiction, for the evidence of Domesday makes it
certain that, just as the assay was employed under the Conqueror, and
indeed under the Confessor, instead of being first introduced under
Henry I., so the valuation in money of the rents from the royal demesne
was not a reform effected, as alleged, by the latter king, but was the
rule under William I.; and, indeed, almost as much the rule before the
Conquest.[145] We gather from Domesday that the Conqueror advanced the
commutation of the old “firma unius diei,” etc., for a sum of money;
but even under his predecessor there were only a few localities in
which the archaic system had lingered on.
I have said something in ‘Feudal England’[146] of the “Firma unius
noctis,” and I would now add to the evidence that I there adduced on
this curious and interesting subject.
In Devonshire we meet with a singular feature, which, I think, has
escaped attention. Exeter, we read, “reddit xviii. lib. per annum.”
I have elsewhere[147] discussed this payment, and shown that it was
strangely small; but I now proceed to a new point, namely, that the
figure 18 may prove highly significant. Lidford, Barnstaple, and
Totnes, we read,[148] “rendered” between them the same amount of
(military) service as Exeter “rendered”; and this service was equally
divided between them.[149] Now, if we turn from the service to the
payments made by this group of boroughs, we find that the “render” of
each was £3 a year, so that the whole group paid £9, exactly half the
“render” of Exeter.[150]
If we follow the clue thus given us, and turn to the manors which Queen
Edith and Harold’s mother and Harold himself had held, but which, in
1086, had passed to the king,[151] we find these remarkable figures:
£15, £30, £45, £18, £48, £1½, £48 (formerly £23), £2, £6, £23 (formerly
£18), £24, £3, £18, £3, £18, £12, £18, £24, £4 (?), £24, £1 (?), £7,
£6, £6, £12, £8, £2, £3, £18, £20 (formerly £24). It is evident enough
that these “renders” are based on some common unit, like the ‘renders’
of the comital manors in Somerset.[152] Moreover, we can trace, in
Cornwall, something of the same kind. The manor of royal demesne which
heads its survey “reddit xii lib. ad pondus et arsuram,”[153] and this
is followed by renders of £8, £5, £6, £3 (‘olim’), £18, £6, £3, £7, £6,
£6, £4, £5. Even a ‘render’ of £8 was duodecimal in a way; for on fo.
121 _b_ it occurs four times as £8 and thrice as “xii markæ.”
Not only is the rent of these manors distinguished from that of those
in private hands by the form ‘reddit,’ instead of ‘valet,’ but the
render is stereotyped, being normally unchanged, while the ‘valet’ ever
fluctuates. The explanation I suggest for these archaic “renders” is
that they represent the commutation of some formerly existing payment
in kind similar to the “firma unius noctis.” If the unit of that
payment was commuted at a fixed rate, it would obviously produce that
artificial uniformity of which we have seen the traces in Devon and
Cornwall. We may thus penetrate behind these “renders” to an earlier
system then extinct.
This conclusion is confirmed, I think, by some striking instances in
Hampshire.[154] Of ‘Neteham’ we read, “T.R.E. et post valuit lxxvi
lib. et xvi sol. et viii den.” (i. 38); and of ‘Brestone,’ similarly,
“T.R.E. et post valuit lxxvi lib. et xvi sol. et viii den.” (i. 38
_b_). The explanation is found in these two entries on the latter fo.:
Bertune. De firma regis E. Edlinges. Hoc manerium reddidit
fuit, et dimidiam diem firmæ dimidiam diem firmæ
reddidit in omnibus rebus ... T.R.E ... T.R.E. valebat
T.R.E. valebat xxxviii lib. et xxxviii lib. et viii sol. et iiii
viii sol. et iiii den. den.
That is, I take it that the half-day’s ferm “rendered” T.R.E. was
worth £38 8_s._ 4_d._, so that the two other manors, for each of which
the sum was £76 16_s._ 8_d._, must originally have rendered a whole
‘firma.’ This gives us the value of the ‘firma’ for the other Hampshire
manors which “rendered.”[155]
We will now return to the ‘Dialogus’ and its statements on the “firma
comitatus.”
It is distinctly asserted, in the above passage, that the ‘firma
comitatus’ only dated from this reform under Henry I.[156] This is
at variance with the strong evidence set forth in my ‘Geoffrey de
Mandeville,’ that Geoffrey’s grandfather, who was dead before this
alleged reform, held Middlesex, Essex, and Herts at farm, the very
amount of the farm due from him being mentioned. But, indeed, in
Domesday itself there are hints, if not actual evidence, that the
‘firma’ was more or less in existence. In Warwickshire, for instance,
“T.R.E. vicecomitatus de Warwic cum burgo et cum regalibus Maneriis
reddebat lxv libras,” etc., etc. In Worcestershire, also, “vicecomes
... de Dominicis Maneriis regis reddit cxxiii lib. et iiii sol. ad
pensum.” Here we have exactly that “summa summarum” of which the
‘Dialogus’ speaks as a novelty introduced under Henry I.[157] Again, in
at least one passage (i. 85), we recognise a distinct allusion to the
“terræ datæ” system:
De hoc Manerio tenet Giso episcopus unum membrum
WETMORE quod ipse tenuit de rege E. Pro eo computat
Willelmus vicecomes in firma regis xii lib. unoquoque anno.
Now we know the history of this manor, which had been detached from the
royal demesne about a quarter of a century before, when Edward gave
it to bishop Giso on his return from his visit to Rome. It follows,
therefore, that £12 must have been, ever since, annually credited
to the sheriff, in consideration of the Crown having alienated this
manor.[158] We thus carry back to a period before the Conquest that
Exchequer practice of the 12th century, which is thus alluded to in
Stephen’s charter to Geoffrey earl of Essex (1141):
Ita tamen quod dominica quæ de prædictis comitatibus data
sunt ... a firma prædicta subtrahantur et ... ad scaccarium
computabuntur.[159]
I hasten to add that the Charter of Constance, the Conqueror’s
daughter, quoted by Stapleton from the Cartulary of Holy Trinity,
Caen, affords an exact parallel in the words: “et ei computabitur in
suo redditu cum dica.” But the fact remains that we can prove the
existence, under Edward the Confessor, of characteristic features
of the later Exchequer system, of which one, at least, as Stapleton
explained, must have been of English origin.
What then was the change that took place on the introduction of the
Exchequer? How did it modify the system previously in existence? Our
only clue is found in the well-known words of the ‘Dialogus’: “Quod
autem hodie dicitur ad scaccarium, olim dicebatur ad taleas.” Writing
as a specialist on Exchequer history, Mr. Hall contends that “this
expression in itself denotes the actual place of receipt and issue
of the revenue rather than a court or council chamber.”[160] But one
cannot see that ‘scaccarium’ in itself denotes a court or council
chamber more than does ‘talea.’ The one was a chequered table, the
other a wooden tally. My own view is that the change really consisted
of the introduction of the chequered table[161] to assist the balancing
of the accounts. Previously, tallies alone would be used, and it
is noteworthy that even after the ‘Exchequer’ system was in full
operation, the deduction for the loss involved by ‘combustion’ was
still effected by tally.[162] I have little doubt that the ‘combustion’
tally was in use in the 11th century for payments “ad arsuram et
pensum.”
Instead, then, of the sheriffs’ accounts being balanced by the cumbrous
system of tallies, the introduction of the Exchequer table, very
possibly under Henry I., enabled them to be depicted to the eye by
an ingenious system of counters. To the modern mind it is strange,
of course, that, while the reformers were about it, they did not
substitute parchment, and work out the accounts on it. But, doubtless
for the benefit of unlearned sheriffs, the old system of ocular
demonstration was still adhered to, and the Treasurer’s Roll merely
recorded the results of the ‘game’ by which the accounts had been
worked out upon the table.
Mr. Hall’s belief is best set forth in an article he contributed to the
‘Athenæum’ (November 27, 1886), and of which he reprinted this passage,
subsequently, in ‘Domesday Studies’ (1891):
There is every reason for believing that the audit machinery
of the ancient Treasury at Winchester was sufficient for the
purpose.... It is true, indeed, that the earliest germ of the
Exchequer is perceptible in these accounts, which were, however,
audited not ‘ad scaccarium,’ but ‘ad taleas,’ _i.e._ in the
Treasury or Receipt at Winchester.... We find in the Pipe Rolls
the old Treasury at Winchester used as a permanent storehouse
for the reserve of treasure, regalia, and records, and we even
find Exchequer business transacted there by way of audit of
accounts, which formed a special office or ‘ministerium’ as late
as 1130 (Pipe Roll 31 Hen. I).[163]
The purchase of the ‘ministerium thesauri Wintoniæ,’ recorded in
the Pipe Roll of 1130,[164] does not affect the question of audit.
There can be no question that the national Treasury, in 1130, was
at Winchester, or that the Treasurer’s official residence was there
also.[165] The really important passages on the roll, passages which I
venture to think have been generally misunderstood, are these:
Et in præterito anno quando comes Gloecestriæ et Brientius
filius Comitis audierunt compotum de thesauro apud Wintoniam.
De istis habuit Willelmus de Pontearc’ xxx li., de quibus
reddidit compotum quando comes Gloecestriæ et Brientius
audierunt compotum de thesauro apud Wintoniam.
It has been assumed that these entries refer to the Exchequer business
of balancing the sheriffs’ accounts, and Madox even went so far as to
draw the conclusion, from their wording, that, at the time of the Roll,
Brian Fitz Count was Treasurer. The true meaning was exactly contrary,
and an interesting allusion is thus obscured.
For the Pipe Rolls do not, as is sometimes imagined, display the
national accounts. They probably do not exhaust the receipts (for some,
it is believed, were paid ‘in camera’), and they certainly only record
a portion of the royal expenditure. What became of the money which
is so continually entered as paid ‘in Thesauro’? It found its way
into the national treasury, whence it was paid out as was required by
writ of ‘Liberate’ addressed to the Treasurer and chamberlains.[166]
Of these outgoings, in the 12th century, there is, it would seem, no
record; but they were certainly audited from time to time, the king
calling on the Treasurer to account for the money in his charge, as,
at the Exchequer, the Treasurer himself had called on the sheriffs to
account for the sums for which they were liable. To this ‘generalis
compotus,’ associated with the Winchester Treasury, there are, in the
‘Dialogus,’ several allusions which may have been somewhat overlooked.
Quod thesaurarius a vicecomite compotum suscipiat, hinc
manifestum est, quod _idem ab eo cum regi placuerit
requiritur_.... Sunt tamen qui dicunt thesaurarium et
camerarios obnoxios tantum hiis quæ scribuntur in rotulis ‘in
thesauro,’ ut _de hiis compotus ab eis exigatur_ (i. 1).
Raro inquam, hoc est, _cum a rege, vel mandato regis, a magnis
regni[167] compotus a thesaurario et camerariis regni totius
recepta suscipitur_ (i. 5).
Thesaurarius et camerarii, nisi regis expresso mandato vel
præsidentis justiciarii, susceptam pecuniam non expendunt:
oportet enim ut habeant auctoritatem rescripti regis de
distributa pecunia, _cum ab eis compotus generalis
exigitur_ (i. 6).
[De combustione] ... ut de summa ejus _thesaurarius et
camerarii respondeant_ (ib.).
These are sufficient allusions to the Treasury, as distinct from the
Exchequer, account. I invite particular attention to this Treasury
audit, because, so far as I can find, it has hitherto escaped notice.
The second extract refers to the use of the £10,000 space on the
chequered table, and therefore proves the use of such a table for the
Treasury account as well.
Now my point is that the earl of Gloucester and Brian ‘Fitz Count,’
in 1130, were magnates (_magni regni_) delegated by the king, as
described in the second passage,[168] to audit the Treasurer’s account.
And this view is confirmed by the fact that William de Pont de l’Arche,
who here accounts to them, is styled by Dr. Stubbs “the Treasurer,”
and is, in any case, subsequently described as “custos thesaurorum
regalium.” Their mission had nothing, I hold, to do with that audit of
the sheriffs’ accounts, which was the annual function of the Exchequer.
There is a remarkable entry on the roll of 1187 which alludes to an
overhauling of the national treasure at Winchester, at the beginning of
that year, the date proving that it was wholly unconnected with either
session of the Exchequer:
Et in custamento numerandi et ponderandi thesaurum apud
Wintoniam post Natale, et pro forulis novis ad reponendum eundem
thesaurum et pro aliis minutis negociis ad predictum opus,
etc.... Et pro carriando thesauro a Wintoniâ ad Saresburiam et
ad Oxinford’ et ad Geldeford’ et ad plura loca per Angliam £4
8_s._ 3_d._
One might compare with these phrases the ‘Dialogus’ language as to the
knights, ‘qui et camerarii dicuntur, quod pro camerariis ministrant.’
Item officium horum est numeratam pecuniam, et in vasis ligneis
per centenos solidos compositam, ponderare, ne sit error in
numero, tunc demum in forulos mittere, etc. (i. 3).
Also the description of the usher’s office:
Hic ministrat forulos ad pecuniam reponendam, etc. (ib.).
But the latter part of the entry (which is duly quoted by Eyton[169])
is also of much importance. For in Mr. Hall’s work, under 1187, we only
read, ‘Treasure conveyed abroad from Winchester.’[170]
It is an essential part of Mr. Hall’s theory, which makes the
“Westminster Treasury ... the principal Treasury of the kingdom,”[171]
that the Winchester Treasury was merely “an emporium in connection with
the transport of bullion (and especially of the regalia and plate),
as well as other supplies, _viâ_ Southampton, or other seaports, to
the Continent.”[172] But the above passage shows us, on the contrary,
treasure sent thence to Salisbury, Oxford, and Guildford. It is
manifest that treasure, despatched from Westminster to Oxford or
Guildford would not be sent _viâ_ Winchester. From this it follows that
Winchester was still a central Treasury, and not a mere ‘emporium’
_en route_ to the south. It is certain that under Henry I., some
sixty years before, the session at Westminster of the Barons of the
Exchequer did not, as Stapleton observed, affect the position of the
national Treasury at Winchester. It is, then, equally certain that the
money received at that session must have been duly transmitted to the
Winchester Treasury. For that was where the treasure (in coined money)
was kept when Stephen succeeded at the close of 1135.
The whole difficulty has arisen from Mr. Hall’s inability to
distinguish between the ‘Receipt’ at Westminster, where the money
was paid in, and the national Treasury at Winchester in which it was
permanently stored. This is, roughly speaking, like confusing a man’s
investments with his balance at his bankers. The steadily growing
importance of Westminster and the concurrent decadence of Winchester
led, of course, eventually, to the shifting of the central Treasury,
but at the time of the ‘Dialogus,’ in the days of Henry II., it is
clear that the Exchequer was not looked on as the seat of a permanent
Treasury. For the storage of treasure is always implied by the payment
for the light of the night watchman; and as to the watchman and his
light, the evidence of the ‘Dialogue’ is clear:
Vigilis officium idem est ibi quod alibi; diligentissima
scilicet de nocte custodia, thesauri principaliter, et omnium
eorum quæ in domo thesauri reponuntur.... Sunt et hiis
liberationes constitutæ _dum scaccarium est, hoc est a die qua
convocantur usque ad diem qua generalis secessio_.... Vigil
unum denarium. Ad lumen cujusque noctis circa thesaurum, obolum
(i. 3).
There is absolutely no escaping from these words: a watchman is only
provided for the treasure “while the Exchequer is in session”; its
treasury is temporary, not permanent. The whole passage, as it seems
to me, is absolutely destructive of Mr. Hall’s hypothesis of “the
existence of a permanent financial staff under the Treasurer and
chamberlains of the Exchequer at Westminster.”[173]
The change from the “Treasury” to the “Exchequer” was, I hold, a
gradual process. Careful study of the annual revenues bestowed by our
sovereigns on the foreign houses of Tiron, Fontevrault, and Cluny[174]
proves clearly how insensibly the “Treasury at Winchester” was
superseded by the “Exchequer at London” as the place of payment. This
is especially the case with Tiron, where Henry I.’s original grant,
made about the middle of his reign, provides for payment “de thesauro
meo, in festo Sancti Michaelis, _Wintonie_.”[175] Under Richard I.
this becomes payable “at Michaelmas from his exchequer at London.”[176]
Documents between the two show us intermediate stages.
Precisely the same gradual process is seen in the parallel development
of the chamberlainship of the “Exchequer” from that of the “Treasury.”
Just as Henry II., shortly before his accession, confirmed the grant
to Tiron as “de thesauro Wintonie,”[177] so he restored to William
Mauduit, at about the same time, “camerariam meam _thesauri_,” which
office was held by his descendants as a chamberlainship of the
_Exchequer_.
The ‘Dialogus’ shows us the Treasurer and the two chamberlains of the
Exchequer as the three inseparable Treasury officers. Domesday connects
the first with Winchester by showing us Henry “thesaurarius” as a
tenant-in-chief in Hampshire. I propose to show that it also connects
one of the chamberlains with that county. In that same invaluable but
unprinted charter of which I have spoken above, which was granted at
Leicester (1153) to William Mauduit, Duke Henry says:
Insuper etiam reddidi eidem camerariam meam thesauri cum
liberatione[178] et cum omnibus pertinentibus, castellum
scilicet de Porcestra ut supradiximus, et omnes terras ad
predictum camerariam et ad predictum castellum pertinentes, sive
sint in Anglia sive Normannia, sicut pater suus illam camerariam
cum pertinentibus melius habuit et sicut Robertus Maledoctus
frater suus eam habebat die quo vivus fuit et mortuus.
This carries back the ‘cameraria thesauri’ (‘_illam_ camerariam’)
to the Domesday tenant, whose son Robert occurs in the earlier
Winchester Survey, and, though dead in 1130, is mentioned on the Roll
of that year (p. 37), in connection with the Treasury in Normandy.
The history of Porchester, in the Norman period, has yet to be worked
out. Mr. Clark, for instance, tells us that the castle was “always in
the hands of the Crown,”[179] yet we find it here appurtenant to the
chamberlainship, and in Domesday (47 _b_) it was a ‘manor’ held by
William Malduith. The above charter, in my opinion, was one of those
which Duke Henry granted without intending to fulfil.[180] Porchester
had clearly been secured by the Crown, and Henry was not the man to
part with such a fortress. Of William Mauduith’s Domesday fief, Hartley
Mauditt (‘Herlege’) also was held by the later Mauduits; but they
held it still “per serjanteriam camar[ariæ] Domini Regis”[181] or “per
camerariam ad scaccarium.”[182]
It should be added that the other chamberlainship of the Exchequer was
similarly a serjeanty associated with land. It cannot, however, be
carried back beyond 1156, when Henry II. bestowed on Warin Fitz Gerold,
chamberlain, lands in Wiltshire worth £34 a year, and in Berkshire
to nearly the same amount.[183] The former was the chamberlainship
estate, and reappears as Sevenhampton (near Highworth) in his brother’s
_carta_ (1166), where it is expressly stated to have been given to
Warin by the king.[184] It was similarly held by his heir and namesake
(with whom he is often confused), under John,[185] and by the latter’s
heir, Margaret ‘de Ripariis,’ under Henry III.[186]
This estate must not be confused with that of Stratton, Wilts, which
was bestowed by John (to whom it had escheated) on the later Warin Fitz
Gerold, to hold at a fee-farm rent of £13 a year.[187] It is necessary
to make this distinction, because Mr. Hall, in dealing with the
subject, speaks of it as “held apparently by the Countess of Albemarle
as pertaining to the (_sic_) chamberlainship of England” (_sic_).[188]
On the same page he speaks of a deed, on page 1024 of the same volume,
whereby she “secures to Adam de Strattone, clerk, an annuity of £13,
charged on the farm of Stratton.” Reference to page 1024 shows that,
on the contrary, what she did was to make herself and her heirs
responsible to the Exchequer for the annual £13, which _was_ “the farm”
of Stratton (so that Adam might hold Stratton quit therefrom). This is
a further instance of Mr. Hall’s unhappy inability to understand or
describe accurately the documents with which he deals.[189]
I have now traced for the first time, so far as I can find, the origin
of the two chamberlainships of the Exchequer. That of Mauduit can
be traced, we see, to a chamberlainship of the ‘Treasury,’ existing
certainly under Henry I., and possibly under the Conqueror. Of the
other the existence is not proved before 1156. Both, I have shown, were
associated with the tenure of certain estates.
It is very strange that, in his _magnum opus_,[190] Madox not only
ignores, it would seem, this descent of the office with certain lands,
but gives a most unsatisfactory account of those who held the office,
confusing it, clearly, with the chamberlainship of England, and not
distinguishing or tracing its holders.
* * * * *
For the different standards of payment in use at the Exchequer, our
authority, of course, is the ‘Dialogus,’ but the subject, I venture to
think, is still exceedingly obscure. Even Mr. Hall, who has studied
so closely the ‘Dialogus,’ seems to leave it rather doubtful whether
payment in ‘blank’ money meant a deduction of 6_d._ or of 12_d._ on the
pound.[191] It will be best to leave the ‘Dialogus’ for the moment, and
take an actual case where the charters and the rolls can be compared,
and a definite result obtained.
In Lans. MS. 114, at fo. 55, there is a series of extracts transcribed
from a Register of Holy Trinity (or Christchurch) Priory, London, in
which are comprised the royal charters relating to Queen Maud’s gift of
two-thirds of the revenues (ferm) of Exeter. First, Henry I. confirms
it, late in his reign,[192] as “xxv libras ad scalam,” the charter
being addressed to William bishop of Exeter, and Baldwin the sheriff
(_sic_). Then we have another charter from him addressed “Rogero
episcopo Sar[esbiriensi] et Baronibus Scaccarii,” and witnessed,
at Winchester, by Geoffrey de Clinton, in which it is “xxv libras
blancas.” Stephen’s charter follows, addressed to William bishop of
Exeter, and Richard son of Baldwin, the sheriff, in which again we have
“xxv lib. ad scalam.” Lastly, we come to an important entry that seems
to have remained unknown:
In 1180, on St. Martin’s Day, king Henry issued (_fecit
currere_) his new money, in the 26th year of his reign, and
as the sheriff of Exeter (_Exon’_) would not pay the prior of
Christchurch, for Michaelmas term, £12 16_s._ 3_d._ “_secundum
pondus blancum_,” Prior Stephen obtained from the king the
following writ.
Then follows a writ which clearly belongs not to 1180, but to an
earlier period. It is addressed “prepositis et civibus Exonie,”
and directs that the canons are to enjoy their rents as in
his grandfather’s time (‘Teste Manessero Biset dapifero, apud
Wirecestriam’). Next comes a passage so important that it must
be quoted in the original words, although, like the whole of the
transcript, it seems slightly corrupt.
Comperuit igitur Paganus attornatus vicecomitis predicti in
Scaccario, ubi inspecto Rotulo Regis in quo continebatur carta
predict[i] r[egis] Quod ecclesiam Christi London debere habere
predictos denarios blancos et ad scalam id est ad pondus qui
fuerint meliores in pondere quam illa nova moneta per vi _s._
iii _d._ pro termino sancti Mich. arch. predicto. Et sic
predictus prior et conventus haberent quolibet anno xii _s._ vi
_d._ de incremento, XXV li. blanc. prout patet in carta sequenti.
The writ of the earl of Cornwall, in 1256, which follows, is obviously
out of place for our period. Lastly, the canons record the triumph of
their case thus:
Perlecta ista carta, constitutus est dies priori Stephano ad
peticionem Pagani clerici gerentis vices vicecomitis Exonie a
Justicia idem cancellario et baronibus scaccarii ut innotesceret
causam istam vicecomiti predicto. Et sic predicti prior et
conventus reciperent predictos xii li. xvi _s._ iii _d._ infra
xii dies natalis domini de tali moneta qualis tunc curreret.
Et ibidem (_i.e._ inde) fuerunt plegii Radulphus de Glanvilla
tunc Justicia Regis et Rogerus filius Reinfridi et Alanus de
Furnellis, coram hiis testibus Gaufrido episcopo Eliensi;
Ricardo thesaurario Regis, postea episcopo Londoniensi; Roberto
Mantello; Michaele Belet; Edwardo clerico; Elia hostiario, et
multis aliis. Ad terminum vero predictun* Willelmus, vicecomes
Exonie, de (_sic_) Br[iwerre], etc.
So at length the prior received the full amount “numeratos, blancos, ad
scalam, tales (eis) quorum xx solidi numerati fecerunt libram Regis.”
Corrupt though the text in places is, the outline of the story is clear
enough, and is supported by such record evidence as survives. The local
authorities, clearly, were directed to pay the canons £25 “ad scalam”
annually, “hoc est,” says the ‘Dialogus,’ “propter quamlibet numeratam
libram vi _d._” This is fully borne out by the Pipe Rolls which both
in 1130 and under Henry II. record the annual payment as £25 12_s._
6_d._ “numero.” When the new coinage became current in 1180, the local
authorities evidently claimed that as they had to pay in standard
coin, they ought no longer to be liable for the 12_s._ 6_d._ excess
which they paid under the old system. The case, however, was given
against them, apparently on the ground that they were liable for 6_d._
additional on every “numbered” pound, irrespective of the quality of
the coin.
The difficulty is created by the use of the term “blancos” throughout
as equivalent to “ad scalam,” an equation which is certainly found in
the text of the charters. It will, however, be better to discuss this
point when dealing with the blanch system as a whole.
Before leaving the above case, we should notice, first, that the
crown had a ‘roll,’ on which were recorded such charters as this of
Henry I. I do not remember mention of such a roll elsewhere. The
question irresistibly suggests itself whether we have not here the
origin of those “Cartæ Antiquæ,” of which the existence, I am given to
understand, has ever yet been accounted for. On turning to these most
interesting records we find that Roll N commences with twenty-three
charters to Holy Trinity Priory, all of them previous to the middle of
Henry II.’s reign. They are transcribed in a hand of the period, those
which follow being later additions. It seems to me, therefore, that in
this “Roll N” we may have the actual “Rotulus Regis,” produced in court
before Glanville, which contained, as does “Roll N,” the charter of
Henry I.
It would seem probable that such charters were already kept in the
Treasury, for reference, under Henry I., though not as yet enrolled.
For a writ of the latter king, addressed to Richard son of Baldwin
(sheriff of Devon) and G. ‘de Furnellis’ directs them to discharge
the land of the canons of Plympton “de geldis et assisis et omnibus
aliis rebus, quia episcopus Sarum _recognovit per cartam de thesauro
meo_ quod ipsa ex toto ita quieta est.”[193]
Secondly, we should note that, although the narrative assigns the issue
of the new coinage to November 11 (1180), yet the sheriff’s deputy
raised his claim at Michaelmas (for that half year’s term). That he
did so is in harmony with the current Pipe Roll, which, as Eyton has
shown, had numerous references to the change of coinage having been in
progress. Lastly, we have here an Exchequer case, hitherto, I believe,
unknown, and learn the names of the officials present, which harmonize
with what we know _aliunde_ of the judicial and financial _personnel_
at the time.
Apart from the “rotulus Regis” discussed above, the Exchequer, it
would seem, enrolled its decisions even under Henry II. We read in
the chronicle of Jocelin de Brakelonde that Abbot Sampson, called
upon to contribute, on behalf of St. Edmund’s Abbey, to a “communis
misericordia” imposed on the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, went
to the king at Clarendon [? February, 1187] and obtained from him
a writ directing “ut sex milites de comitatu de Norfolchia et sex
de Suffolchia summonerentur ad recognoscendum coram baronibus
scaccarii utrum dominia Sancti Ædmundi deberent esse quieta de
communi misericordia.”[194] When the knights had found their verdict,
“justiciarii assidentes veredictum illorum inrollaverunt.”
* * * * *
We may now return to the reckonings in use at the early Exchequer.
It may fairly be said that in 1130 the _normal_ method of accounting
for the ferm was the payment by the sheriff of silver “ad pensum,” the
allowance to him of his outgoings “numero,” and the reckoning of the
balance in “blanch” money. The counties of which the sheriffs paid in
their silver “ad pensum” were Notts and Derby, Hampshire, Surrey with
Cambridgeshire and Hunts, Essex and Herts, Gloucestershire, Northants
and Leicestershire, Norfolk and Suffolk, Warwick, Lincolnshire, Berks
and Devon, seventeen in all. Dorset and Wilts, Kent, and Bucks and
Beds, that is five counties, had their silver paid partly “ad pensum”
and partly “numero.” Northumberland, Carlisle, and Sussex, were
accounted for “numero,” in accordance with the ‘Dialogus.’[195] For
Yorkshire the silver was paid in “numero,” but the balance accounted
for “blanch”; Cornwall seems to be accounted for “numero.” London and
Staffordshire alone have sheriffs who pay in their silver “blanch.”
In this labyrinth of account one point at least is clear. The outgoings
credited to the sheriff “numero” were “blanched,” exactly as described
in the ‘Dialogus,’ by a uniform deduction of a shilling in the
pound.[196] This is proved by the account for the outstanding ferm
of Berkshire, rendered by Anselm _vicomte_ of Rouen.[197] He has to
account for £522 18_s._ “blanch.” For this he pays in £251 6_s._ 8_d._
“blanch,” claims £63 4_s._ 5_d._ “numero” for money disbursed by the
king’s writ, and is left owing £211 10_s._ “blanch.” Now, if we deduct
a shilling in the pound from £63 4_s._ 5_d._, we obtain £60 1_s._
2½_d._ “blanch.” Adding up the three “blanch” amounts, we have £522
17_s._ 10½_d._, which is within a penny halfpenny of the sum he has to
account for.
We may further say that this Pipe Roll reveals a tendency to reduce
all the ferms to a “blanch” denomination; that is to say that the
balance left outstanding is normally given in “blanch” money, and
accounted for accordingly in a subsequent year. Moreover, when it
is so accounted for, the sheriff pays in his money, not “ad pensum”
but “blanch.” Examples of this are found in the cases of Wilts and
Dorset, Hampshire, Surrey with Cambridge and Hunts, Essex and Herts,
Gloucestershire, Leicestershire and Northants, etc. It seems to be
only when a sheriff is rendering his account “de Nova Firma” that he
pays in money “ad pensum.” The provoking practice of not recording the
amount of the ferm to be accounted for makes it impossible to check
these different methods of reckoning. In the case, however, of Bosham,
we have the “veredictum” in the ‘Testa’ that its annual ferm was “xlii
libras arsas et ponderatas”; and though this of itself might be slight
evidence,[198] it is in harmony with the Pipe Rolls of Henry II. Now in
that of 1130 the ferm is thus accounted for:
£ _s._ _d._
27 3 8 ‘ad pensum.’
0 5 0 ‘numero.’
0 8 0 ‘ad pensum.’
16 0 10 ‘blanch.’
This is equivalent to £16 5_s._ 7_d._ ‘blanch’ plus £27 11_s._ 8_d._
‘ad pensum.’ If then the total ferm was £42 ‘blanch,’ we have an excess
of £1 17_s._ 3_d._ ‘ad pensum.’ If this calculation is to be depended
on, it would give us a deduction of about sixteenpence in the pound
from the weighed money when subjected to assay.
In 1157, the ferm was accounted for as follows:
£31 13_s._ 8_d._ “blanch,” paid in by sheriff.
13_s._ 4_d._ “numero,” already to his credit.
£12 7_s._ 4_d._ “numero,” paid out.
Deducting, as before, a shilling in the pound from the sums reckoned
“numero,” we find them amount to £12 7_s._ 8_d._ “blanch.” Adding
this amount to the £31 13_s._ 8_d._ “blanch,” we have £44 1_s._ 4_d._
to the accountant’s credit. But the ferm was only £42 “blanch.” He
had, therefore, a “superplus” of £2 1_s._ 4_d._ “blanch,” and that is
precisely what the roll records that he had. We may then, from this
comparison, conclude positively that the money paid in “ad pensum” was
liable to a further deduction when the assay made it “blanch.”
The case of Bosham certainly suggests that in the time of Henry I. the
ferm on the “Rotulus exactorius” might be reckoned in ‘blanch’ money,
even where the accountant paid in his cash by weight. But what is
obscure is why the cash so paid should be merely entered ‘ad pensum,’
instead of its assayed value being recorded as under Henry II. For this
value must have been ascertained in order to balance the account.
It is noteworthy that, although the ‘Dialogus’ speaks of payment “ad
scalam,” as entered on the rolls of Henry I., the phrase is not found
on the roll of 1130. In the case of Exeter, as we have seen, the £25
“ad scalam” were entered on the roll as £25 12_s._ 6_d._ “numero.”
Broadly speaking, the impression created by the Roll of 1130 is that
the administration was endeavouring to systematize the ‘ferm’ payments,
which, we may gather from the evidence of Domesday, had been almost
chaotic in diversity. From the earliest rolls of Henry II. we find a
uniform “blanch” system (with the trifling exceptions the ‘Dialogus’
mentions), which testifies probably to further reforms between 1130
and 1139 (when bishop Roger fell). There remained, however, the sad
confusion caused by the several meanings of “blanch”; the true assay
involving a deduction of variable amount; the fixed deduction of a
shilling in the pound, to “blanch” the money paid out “numero”; and
the fixed addition of sixpence in the pound (“numero”) to sums granted
“blanch,” as in the Exeter case.
* * * * *
If, in conclusion, it be asked what was the origin of the Exchequer,
the answer is not one that can be briefly given. In the first place, it
must not be assumed that “the Exchequer” was bodily imported, as a new
and complete institution, from Normandy to England or _vice versâ_.
In the second place, the ‘Dialogus’ we have seen, is by no means an
infallible authority for the events of the Norman period. In the third
place, its author was biassed by his eagerness to exalt bishop Roger,
his relative and the founder of his family.
Leaving that treatise aside for the moment, the evidence adduced
in this paper points to the gradual development of the ‘Exchequer’
out of the ‘Treasury’ under Henry I. And this view is curiously
confirmed by the remarkable, perhaps unique, narrative in the Abingdon
Cartulary[199] of a plea held in the _curia regis_ “apud Wintoniam
in thesauro.” This plea cannot be later than 1114, and it is difficult
to resist the impression that “in thesauro” is purposely introduced,
and represents the “ad scaccarium” of later days. That is to say,
that the hearing of pleas was already connected with the financial
administration,[200] probably because its records were, in certain
cases, needed.
I have suggested that the gradual change of name may have been
a consequence of the introduction of the ‘chequered cloth’
(_scaccarium_). But this innovation, probably, was only one of those
which marked the gradual transition to the final Exchequer system.
Even under Henry II., for instance, Master Thomas Brown and his third
roll were, says the ‘Dialogus,’ an utter innovation, and the place
assigned to Richard of Ilchester seems to have been the same. Thus the
system was by no means complete at bishop Roger’s death, nor, on the
other hand, were its details, even then, his own work alone. He did but
develop what he found.
It is quite possible that further exploration of that most fertile
field for discovery, the cartularies of monastic houses, may cast a
clearer light on this institutional development. For it was a belated
document transcribed in the cartulary of Merton that has enabled
me[201] to prove the existence of the Exchequer _eo nomine_ in
Normandy under Henry I. But it is not likely that such discovery will
materially affect the views which I have enunciated above on the origin
of the English Exchequer. For, after all, they are, in the main, the
same as those which Dr. Stubbs, with his sound instinct, shadowed forth
when the evidence was even less.
If I have gone further than himself, it has been in criticising more
searchingly the authority of the ‘Dialogus de Scaccario’ for the reign
of Henry I., in demonstrating the actual evolution of the “scaccarium”
from the “thesaurus,” and in tracing the origin of the chamberlain’s
office and its feudal, tenurial character. The alternative use of
‘blancæ’ and ‘ad scalam’ in the reign of Henry I. is, I believe, a
new discovery, and so, it would seem, is that Treasury audit on which
I have laid special stress. Petty details, it may be said, and of
slight historical importance. So thought Richard the son of Nigel,
pleading: “nec est vel esse potest in eis subtilium rerum descriptio,
vel jocunda novitatis inventio.”[202] And yet he heard the student’s
cry: “cur scientiam de scaccario quæ penes te plurima esse dicitur
alios non doces, et, ne tibi commoriatur, scripto commendas?” For as
we have been reminded by the publication of the ‘Red Book of the
Exchequer, it may be true now as then, even of those who are steeped in
its records, that “sicut qui in tenebris ambulant et manibus palpant,
frequenter offendunt, sic illic multi resident qui videntes non vident,
et audientes non intelligunt.”[203]
V
London Under Stephen
The famous claim of the citizens of London at the death of Henry I.,
that the election of a king rested with themselves;[204] and the
prominent part they actually took in placing Stephen on the throne,
after making special terms with him,[205] impart peculiar interest to
such glimpses as records afford us of the government, institutions, and
leading citizens of London in Stephen’s days. Of these I have treated
at some length in my work on Geoffrey de Mandeville,[206] but the
information there given can now be supplemented by documents relating
to the two ancient religious foundations of Holy Trinity Priory,
Aldgate, and the collegiate church of St. Martin’s-le-Grand.
The earliest of these with which I shall deal is assigned to the second
year of Stephen, and is taken from the cartulary of Holy Trinity, now
preserved at Glasgow, of which there is a modern collated transcript
in the Guildhall Library. It has never yet, I believe, been printed.
As Stephen was absent in Normandy from Midlent to the end of November,
1137, the episode must belong either to the early months of the year or
to its close.[207] The text seems slightly corrupt in places, but is
trustworthy enough for all purposes. The first points of interest to
be noted are that Arnulf archdeacon of Séez, afterwards the well-known
bishop of Lisieux, who here appears at Stephen’s court, had been, as
I have shown, the year before, his spokesman before the Pope when his
right was challenged by the Empress;[208] and that Andrew Buchuinte,
a leading citizen, was clearly “Justiciar of London” at the time, in
accordance with my theory that such an office was actually created by
the well-known charter of Henry I.[209]
It should also be observed that the question of title is carried back
straight to the days of Edward the Confessor, and is decided by the
oath of twenty-one men, familiar, evidently, with the locality, in the
style of the 11th century. The list of jurors is headed by Or(d)gar ‘le
prude,’ who seems to have become a monk (_monachus_) since he had
taken so prominent a part in transferring the ‘soke’ of the Cnihtengild
to Holy Trinity Priory in 1125.[210]
The land in dispute was in “East Smithfield,” within the soke of the
Cnihtengild, which lay outside the wall from Aldgate to the Thames, and
therefore adjoined immediately the Tower precinct. The Priory having
now acquired the soke, complained that successive constables of the
Tower had encroached upon this land to make a vineyard. The document
which follows records the result.[211]
Secundo autem anno regni Stephani Regis quodam vice cum
esset Rex Westm[onasterio] adiit prefatus prior [Normannus]
assistentibus et auxiliantibus sibi Regina Matilde ipsius Regis
conjuge, Algaro episcopo Constanciensi, Rogero tunc cancellario,
Arnulfo archidiacono Sagiensi, Willelmo Martel dapifero, Roberto
de Courcy, Albrico de Ver, Gaufrido de Magnavilla, Hugone le
Bigot, Adam de Balnai, Andrea Buchuinte, pluribusque aliis
burgensibus Londoniæ, adiit eum et diligenter ostendit qua vi
vel injuria pars illa a reliqua fuerit separata; advocat’ et
Aschuillo coram Rege quesitum est ab quo jure partem illam
tenuisset et quid super eam clamasset. Ipse vero r[espo]ndit se
nil super ea clamare, sed _sic inquit: tenui_[212] Tunc
Rex viva voce Andr[eæ] Justiciario suo ceterisque Burgensibus
qui ibi aderant precepit (?) ipsis et ceterisque per breve suum
mandavit quatinus certum diem priori constituerent in quo super
eandem terram convenientes rem rationabiliter examinarent,
examinata autem sic permaneret quemadmodum fuerat in tempore
Regis sancti Eadwardi.[213] Quod si prior potuisset ostendere
partem illam esse de predicto jure ecclesie sine dilacione
seisiatur. Quod ita factum est. Statuto die super eandem terram
convenerunt ex una parte prior cum coadiutoribus suis, ex alia
parte Andreas Buchuinte et plures alii maiores et meliores
Lond[onie]. Ratione igitur deducta a tempore sancti Eadwardi
Regis usque ad illum diem quo hoc fiebat, inventum est et
ostensum illam partem ad reliquam pertinere et totam similiter
de predicto jure. Quod et ibidem probatum est multis testibus
et sacrament’ xxj^o hominum quorum hec sunt nomina: Orgarus
Monachus cognomento le prude, Ailwinus filius Radumf’ Estmund’
Alfricus Cherch’ Briccred Cucherd Wlfred’ Semar Batum Alsi
Berman Wlpsi faber Alfwin Hallen Leuesune faber Wlwin’ Abbot,
Ailwin’ clericus, Algarus frater Gerald’, Wlfric carnifex,
Elfret Cugel Wlfric’ Edric’ Modheuesune Godwinus Balle; et multi
alii parati fuerunt jurare, sed isti judicati sunt sufficere.
Hoc itaque modo hæcque ratione et justicia tota illa terra et
soca adjudicatum est predicte ecclesie. Quam Stephanus Rex
confirmat prefate ecclesie (vel priori?) per cartam sequentem.
Stephanus Rex Angl[orum] Episcopo London[iensi] Justic[iariis],
vicecomitibus, baronibus, Ministris, et omnibus fidelibus suis
Francis et Anglis lond[oniæ] salutem. Sciatis quia reddidi
et concessi deo et ecclesiæ sanctæ Trinitatis Lond[oniæ] et
canonicis regularibus ibidem deo[214] servientibus pro anima
Regis Henrici et pro salute mea et Matild[is] Regine uxoris
meē et Eustac[ii] filii mei et aliorum puerorum meorum in
perpetuum terram suam de Smethefelda quam comes Gaufridus
preoccupaverat ad vineam suam faciendam. Quare volo et firmiter
precipio quod bene et in pace et libere et quiete et honorifice
teneant et habeant terram predictam sicut melius et liberius et
quietius tenent alias terras suas et sicut Rex Henricus illam
eis concessit et carta sua confirmavit.
Testibus: Matilde regina, et Thoma capellano, et Willelmo de
Ipra, et Ricardo de Luci. Apud Lond[oniam.][215]
The charter which follows, being granted by Geoffrey de Mandeville as
earl, may safely be assigned to 1140–1144. It is difficult to resist
the impression, from the appearance among the witnesses of a Templar
and two doctors, that this was an act of restitution by the earl when
he was lying on his deathbed in 1144.[216]
Item Gaufridus comes Essex ac constabularius principalis Turris
renunciavit totum clamorem suum de predicta terra ut p[atet] per
cartam sequentem.
Gaufridus comes Essex Episcopo Londoniensi et omnibus fidelibus
sancte ecclesie salutem. Sciatis me reddidisse ecclesie
Christi Lond[onie] et fratribus in ea degentibus molendina
sua juxta Turrim et totum terram extra quæ pertinebat ad
Engliscnithtengildam[217] cum Smethefelda et hominibus et
omnibus aliis rebus eidem pertinentibus. Reddo et eis dim. hidam
de Brembelega in terra et pratis et pascuis et omnibus aliis
rebus et libertatibus et consuetudinibus sicut Willelmus filius
Widonis eam eis dedit cum canonicalem habitum reciperet. Et volo
et precipio ut prefatas terras teneant de me et heredibus meis
liberas et quietas et solutas ab omni calumpnia et seculari
servicio ita ut nec heredes mei nec meis imposterum aliquam canc
super hiis liceat inuriam vel contumeliam irrogare.
Hiis testibus: Roh[ais]a comitissa uxore mea; Gregorio
dapifero; Pagano de Templo; Warino filio Geroldi; Radulfo de
Crichtote;[218] Gaufrido de Querendun; Ernulfo medico; Iwodo
medico. Et similiter concedo eis imperpetuum i marcam argenti de
servicio Edwardi de Seligeford testimonio prescriptorum testium
et Willelmi archidiaconi London’.
Hec omnia acta fuerunt anno ij^o Regis Stephani istis
astantibus, audientibus, et videntibus: Radulfo filio Algodi,
Radulfo cancellario Sancti Pauli, Hacone decano, Willelmo
Travers, Gilberto presbitero, Lungo presbitero, Wimundo
presbitero, Josepho presbitero, Godefrido presbitero, Johanne
presbitero, Huberto presbitero, Leofwino presbitero, Godardo
presbitero, Alurico presbitero, Ricardo presbitero, Jacobo
clerico, Gervasio clerico, Willelmo clerico, Andrea Buchuinte,
Stephano Bukerel, Willelmo camerario, Radulfo filio Andree,
Laurentio Buchuinte, Theodorico filio Dermanni, Johanne
Buchuinte, Stephano Bukerel, Gileberto Beket, Gervasio filio
Agn[etis], Hugone filio Ulgari, Eustachio nepote Fulcredi,
Walkelino, Roberto filio Radulfi fratribusque ejus Ricardo et
David, Ailwardo fabr’, Edmundo Warde Aldermanno, Edwardo filio
Simonis (?) Edgaro Fulōe, Edward Roberto fil. But’ Alfego
Ailwino Godwino Radulfo Godesune et Algaro filio eis et Edmundo
fratre eius Huneman Suethin Edwardo Her’ Godwino Bredhers
Herewardo Geraldo Rufo Sexi Forfot, Godwino Oxefot Johanne filio
Edwini Sawardo Siredo ceterisque multis non solum.
With this latter portion of the document we return to 1137, and meet
with names of considerable interest. Foremost among these is that of
Gilbert Beket, the first mention, I believe, of him in a document that
has ever come to light. Ralf son of Algod, who heads the list, had
also headed the list of the fifteen citizens by whom the Cnihtengild’s
soke had been given to the Priory in 1125. He also appears in charge
of one of the city wards in the list of _circ._ 1130.[219] Was he
identical with Ralf son of Algod, who occurs as a canon of St. Paul’s
in 1104 and 1132?[220] For my part, I think that he was. Improbable
though the combination may seem, there can be little doubt that the
canons of St. Paul’s were as closely connected at the time with secular
life in London as they were with farming in Essex. Hugh, son of
Wulfgar, to take another of these names, had been, like Ralf, among the
fifteen of the Cnihtengild list, twelve years before, and, like him,
had charge of a ward in the list of _circ._ 1130. He was a London
magnate of whom we shall hear more.
The names of these two men raise an important question. That ancient
and remarkable institution, the English Cnihtengild of London, remains
shrouded in mystery. It is known to us only through the gift of its
soke to Holy Trinity Priory, and the consequent preservation, among
that Priory’s monuments, of charters confirming that soke, from Edward
the Confessor downwards. Stow made use of the Priory’s cartulary,
and states the facts accurately enough. Mr. Coote, in 1881, rendered
valuable service by printing, from the Guildhall Letter Books,
the documents relating to “the English Gilds of Knights and their
socn’,”[221] but fell into the error of supposing that “after thus
parting with their land all these gentlemen entered religion in the
same convent which they had thus benefited.”[222] Writing some years
later (1887), with the St. Paul’s documents before him, Mr. Loftie, in
his well-known book, went further still. “There can be no doubt,” he
writes,[223] “if any doubt existed before, that the governing body of
London was the Knightenguild, as Stow calls it.” This assumption seems
to be based on the view that among its fifteen named representatives
(1125) “there was a very large proportion of aldermen,[224] and that
those who do not seem themselves to have held office were the sons or
the brothers of aldermen.”[225] Admitting that a few out of the fifteen
can, like Ralf and Hugh above, be identified with those who had charge
of wards _temp._ Henry I., this no more proves that the gild
itself was “the governing body of London” than would the presence of
some Aldermen among the members of a city company to-day prove that
it occupied that position. It is not improbable, by the way, that
the gild had become, like a modern city company, a mere propertied
survival. But, apart from the question of its status, what we have to
consider is whether the fifteen magnates of 1125 did, as alleged, enter
the Priory themselves as canons when they made their gift.[226] Mr.
Loftie positively asserts that they did:
The lords of the adjacent manor, the portsoken, then fifteen in
number, members of the Knightenguild, and all, or nearly all,
aldermen,[227] took the resolution, so characteristic of the
religious life of the twelfth century, to enter Norman’s priory
... dedicating their own lives, etc.[228]
This view is absolutely erroneous, and rests on a misunderstanding of
the words--
Suscipientes fraternitatem et participium beneficiorum loci
illius per manum Normanni prioris, qui eos et predecessores suos
in societatem super textum evangelii recepit.[229]
This, of course, is merely the usual admission of benefactors to a
share in the spiritual benefits appertaining to the brotherhood. The
fact that the benefactors’ “predecessors” were admitted also should
have clearly shown that there was no question of personally becoming
canons in the Priory.[230]
As a matter of fact several of the fifteen citizens can, from records,
be identified and traced, if only we reject, at the outset, the whole
of the wild confusion into which Mr. Loftie has plunged them.[231]
We may take, for instance, “Ailwinus et Robertus frater eius filii
Leostani,”[232] whose father I make to be Leofstan the son of Orgar.
These brothers witness one St. Paul’s document in the time of Dean
Ralf,[233] and are mentioned in another,[234] and they are addressed in
a letter of archbishop Theobald (1139–43).[235] Robert accounts for the
Weavers’ Gild of London in 1130,[236] while Æthelwine, who witnesses a
deed under Dean William, and two under Dean Ralf, will also be found
witnessing a charter of the earl of Essex in 1142–3.[237] It is this
Æthelwine (‘Ailwinus’) who is wrongly identified by Mr. Loftie with
the father of the first Mayor, and with ‘Aylwin child,’ and with a
son-in-law of Orgar le Prude, who, by the way, was Orgar ‘the deacon,’
and not Orgar ‘le Prude.’[238]
Two other interesting members of “the fifteen” are “Leostanus aurifaber
et Wyzo filius eius”; for the latter is clearly identical with that
“Witso filius Leostani” who, so far from being an Austin canon, owes in
1130 half a marc of gold “pro terra et ministerio patris sui,”[239] and
with that “Wizo aurifaber” who, with Edward his brother and John his
son, makes an agreement with the canons of St. Paul’s.[240]
Returning to the second list of 1137,[241] we recognise in Hacon the
dean, not a dean of St. Paul’s, but a witness of the Cnihtengild’s gift
in 1125.[242] Tierri son of Deorman was the heir, perhaps the son, of
that “Derman of London” who is entered in Domesday as holding half a
hide at Islington, and the father of Bertram, “filius Theodorici filii
Derman,” otherwise Bertram “de Barwe,” who held Newington Barrow in
Islington,[243] who was a benefactor to the nuns of Clerkenwell, and
whose son Thomas bestowed a serf upon St. Paul’s about the beginning
of the 13th century.[244] The mention of this family leads me here
to introduce a most singular genealogy, evidently adduced to prove,
_temp._ John, that Peter son of Alan was heir to Thierri, a grandson
and namesake of Thierri son of Derman.
Hubert vint de Cham et engendra Alain et Gervase et Will[elme]
Blemunt le viel et altres. Alain le eisne engendra Pieres, et
P[ieres] Alain, et A[lain] P[ieres]. Gerveise engendra Henri, et
Henri Johane ki fu dunée a Hug[ues] de Nevile. Will[] Blemunt
prist la suer Bertra[m] de Barue et engendra Will’ et T[er]ri
et altres. Will’ devint chanoine a sainte ternite [_sic_] de
Lundres et T[er]ri prist la fille Ernaud le rus et engendra une
fille si cum lem dist. Iceste fille fu dunée a un petit fiz
Johan Viel[245] dunt si ele mært sanz heir de soi. Les heirs al
devant dit Alain sunt heirs, kar il sunt les eisnez.[246]
This genealogy, which, we shall find, is certainly incorrect, gives us
a pedigree as follows:
HUBERT of Caen
|
+-------------+---------------+
| | |
ALAN GERVASE WILLIAM
| (of Cornhill) BLEMUND
| | ‘le viel’
| | |
PETER HENRY WILLIAM TIERRI
| (of Cornhill) Canon of |
| | Holy Trinity |
| | |
ALAN JOAN = HUGH A DAUGHTER
| DE NEVILE ob. s. p.
PETER
We know (from the names of his son and granddaughter) that the Gervase
of the text must be Gervase of Cornhill, who, as a matter of fact,
had a brother Alan.[247] But we also know that their father was Roger
‘nepos Huberti,’[248] not Hubert. As there seem to be traces of
another Hubert with sons Gervase and Alan,[249] this may account for
the confusion. The mention of William Blemund is of special interest,
because it is from this name that Bloomsbury [‘Blemundsbury’] is
derived. His wife, being a sister of Bertram de Barue,[250] was a
daughter of Tierri the son of Derman, which accounts for one of their
sons bearing the name of ‘Terri.’ The belief that this great civic
family sprang originally from Caen is a fact to be noted.
We know that Ralf ‘filius Andree’ (p. 101) must have been a son of
Andrew Bucuinte, for “Andreas Bucuinte et Radulfus filius ejus” witness
a Ramsey charter under Henry I.[251] William “camerarius” is, no doubt,
the William “qui fuit camerarius Lond[onie],” who accounts for London
debts on the roll of 1130.[252]
We have seen above that Andrew Buchuinte (_Bucca Uncta_) was,
in 1137, Justiciar of London. This clue is of great importance, for,
according to another portion of the Holy Trinity narrative, Andrew
Buchuinte was the leading witness at the investiture of the Priory with
the Cnihtengild’s soke by the two sheriffs of London in 1125.[253] He
was also a leading witness to that agreement between Ramsey Abbey and
Holy Trinity Priory, which I place between 1125 and 1130.[254]
The charter to which we are now coming shows him addressed by Stephen
as the leading man in London in the latter part, we gather, of 1139.
Since the appearance of “Justiciars” under Henry I., among those to
whom writs and charters were addressed, they always took precedence of
the sheriff, and my contention is that when a magnate is named in that
position, it is because he was Justiciar. The charters dealt with in
this paper afford several instances in point. This one, for example,
may be given here, although of somewhat later date.
Stephanus rex Angl[orum] Ricardo de Luci et vicecomiti Essex
[ie] salutem. Precipio quod Episcopus Wyntoniensis frater meus
ita bene et in pace teneat....[255] et capella(m) sua(m) que
canonici diracionaverunt sicut Rogerus episcopus Salisburiensis
melius tenuit tempore comitis Eustachii de Bolonia et deinceps
usque ad diem qua rex Henricus avunculus meus fuit vivus et
mortuus. Et super hoc non ponantur canonici sui de Sancto
Martino in placitum versus prepositum de Wyrtela de vel de
pecunia sua. Et Moric[ius] vicecomes quietus sit de plegio
illius et pecunia canonicorum quam replegiant.
Teste Roberto de Ver apud Wyndsor[es].[256]
The address of this charter would seem to support the view I suggested
in ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville’ (p. 109), that Richard de Luci may have
held the post of local justiciar of Essex.[257] For the sheriff,
clearly, was Maurice (de Tiretei, _i.e._ Tiltey).[258] Imperfect
though it be, we can, I think, connect the subject in dispute with
an aggression consequent on the Conquest by the ‘pious founder’ at
Writtle.[259]
Let us now return to the document of which I speak above (p. 109, l. 1):
Stephanus dei gratia rex Anglie Andr[ee] Buch[uinte] et
vic[ecomiti] et civibus suis London[ie] salutem. Precipio quod
R[ogerus] episcopus Saresberiensis teneat ecclesiam Sancti
Martini London[ie] et omnes terras eidem pertinentes in civitate
et extra ita bene et honorifice sicut melius tenuit tempore
regis Henrici et modo postea. Et de quocunque disseisitus est
ipse vel ecclesia sua et canonici sui ejusdem ecclesie postquam
discordia incepta inter nos, reseisiantur, et nominatim de terra
Alderesgate disseisiti sunt ipse et canonici sui pro filiis
Huberti juvenis, et bene et in pace teneant, sicut tenuerunt
melius die quâ rex Henricus fuit vivus et mortuus, et modo
postea.[260]
In 1139, therefore, as in 1137, Andrew was the leading man in London;
and if, as Dr. Stubbs believes, he was of Italian origin,[261] we have
a somewhat unlooked-for foreign influence in the midst of the citizens
of London at this most critical epoch. One is indeed reminded of the
‘Buccanigra’ family, and the great part they played at Genoa in the
13th century. It is also suggested by Dr. Stubbs that the “Andrew of
London” who led the citizens’ contingent at the taking of Lisbon (1147)
“is not improbably the Andrew Bucquinte whose son Richard was the
leader of the riotous young nobles of the city who in 1177 furnished a
precedent for the Mohawks of the eighteenth century.”[262] The episode
in question, although entered under 1177, seems to belong to 1174;
but, apart from chronology, we cannot believe that “quidam latronum
illorum, Andreas Bucquinte qui cæteros præibat cum face ardenti”[263]
was himself the crusading leader of 1147, still less the London magnate
of half a century before. The Richard who is styled his “son” by Dr.
Stubbs proves to be merely another reading, in one of the texts,
for Andrew himself.[264] The great Andrew (of 1125–1139) had a son
Ralf,[265] and also a son John, who made Gervase of Cornhill and his
son Henry his heirs.[266] It is very tempting to identify this Andrew
Buccuinte with ‘Andrew of London,’ but ‘Andreas de Londonia’ is found
as a witness to a Ramsey charter under Henry I.,[267] while Andrew
Buccuinte used to attest under his own name. There is also a group of
three charters of this John son of Andrew Buccuinte in the Colchester
cartulary (fo. 133) which have points of interest. The first is
witnessed _inter alios_ by Tierri (_Teodricus_), son of Derman and his
brother,[268] by Eadwine the alderman, and by Gervase of Cornhill; the
second grants land (“in custodia Blacstani”) to Baldwin “clerico patris
mei et magistro meo”; the third grants to him the land in which stood
the ‘fornax’ of John’s father, Andrew, in St. Stephen’s, Walbrook.[269]
I would here insert an observation on the riots of “1177.” The ‘Gesta
Henrici’ describes the episode under 1177, but dates it in “tertio
præcedenti anno.” Miss Norgate accordingly places it “about June or
July 1174,” and points out that Hoveden omits the above words, thus
confusing the chronology.[270] Now the ‘Gesta’ asserts that Andrew
Buchuinte denounced among his companions
quidam nobilissimus et ditissimus civium Londoniarum qui
nominatus est Johannes Senex. Qui cum per judicium aquæ se
mundari non posset, obtulit quingentas marcas domino regi pro
vita habenda. Sed quia ipse per judicium aque perierat, noluit
denarios illos accipere, et præcepit ut judicium de eo fieret,
et suspensus est.[271]
I suggest that ‘Senex’ is merely an elegant Latinization of ‘Viel,’
the name of a leading London family,[272] which was usually Latinized
“Vetulus.” And we have but to turn to the Pipe Roll of 1175 (21 Hen.
II.) to find this entry:
Vicecomes reddit compotum de xlii s. et ix d. de catallis
Johannis Vetuli suspensi et Johannis Lafaite[273] fugitivi (p.
20).
Here we have the proper formula under the assize of Clarendon,[274]
with which we may compare clause V. in the Inquest of Sheriffs (1170):
De catallis fugitivorum pro assisa de Clarendune, et de catallis
eorum qui per assisam illam perierunt, inquiratur quid actum sit
... et an aliquis retatus relaxatus fuerit, vel reus, pro præmio
vel promissione vel amore, et quis inde præmium acceperit.
Here we have Henry denouncing in 1170 that escape of criminals through
bribery, which we have seen him, above, refusing to connive at four or
five years later, when he was offered “quingentas marcas”--Miss Norgate
says “five thousand”; but one must not be severe on a lady’s Latin.
But if the accuracy of the ‘Gesta’ tale is thus remarkably confirmed,
we can hardly accept its description of the man whose chattels produced
so little for the Crown as one of the richest of Londoners. I have not
observed him elsewhere on the rolls, so that probably he was only a
youthful member of his family.
* * * * *
To return. Andrew “of the oily mouth” must have ceased to occupy his
high office shortly after Stephen’s writ of 1139, for we soon find it
held by no less interesting a man than Osbert “Octodenarii,” otherwise
“Huitdeniers.” This was no other than Becket’s kinsman and employer,
whom Garnier terms
Un riche hume Lundreis
Ke mult ert koneiiz et de Frauns et d’Engleis.
Other biographers of Thomas describe him as “vir insignis in civitate
et multarum possessionum, ... qui non solum inter concives, verum etiam
apud curiales, grandis erat nominis et honoris.”[275] It has been
concluded that the future primate was in Osbert’s employment somewhere
about 1139–1142,[276] and, according to William Fitz Stephen, “receptus
est in partem sollicitudinis reipublicæ Londoniensis.” From the
evidence now about to be adduced we learn that Osbert was actually in
power at the very time when his young kinsman is believed to have been
in his employment. The agreement, therefore, is curiously complete.
Stephanus rex Anglie etc. Osberto octoden[arii] et omnibus
Baronibus et vic[ecomiti] et ministris suis London[ie]
salutem. Precipio quod faciatis resaisiri ecclesiam Sancti
Martini London[ie] et canonicos de terra et de domibus suis
de Aldersgate unde filii Huberti juvenis eos injuste et sine
judicio dissaisierunt sicut inde saisiti fuerunt antequam
episcopus Sar[esberiensis] captus fuisset apud Oxon[iam],
et sicut precepi per aliud breve meum. Et quod ipsi postea
ceperunt reddi facite juste. Et postea si ipsi quicquid in
terras clamaverint Episcopus Wintoniensis cuius ecclesia est et
canonici teneant eis inde rectum. Et videte ne audiam amplius
inde clamorem.[277]
This writ, which, it would seem, has never yet been printed, is
subsequent, not only to the one which is given above (p. 110), but to
the death of the bishop of Salisbury in December, 1139.[278] From it we
learn that the deanery of St. Martins, which had been held by Roger,
was given by Stephen, at Roger’s death, to his own brother, the bishop
of Winchester. It is probable that this deanery was a very lucrative
appointment, and that its estates were separate from those of the
canons of the church. Count Eustace, in his charter addressed to Hugh
d’Orival bishop of London, speaks of retaining for himself the lands
“quæ propriæ fuerunt Ingelrici et ad decanatum pertinere debeant,” and
a charter of the Empress similarly speaks of the houses and lands in
London “quæ pertinent ad decanatum.”
The subject of these deaneries of houses of secular canons seems to
deserve working out. As the great bishops of Salisbury and Winchester
held successively the deanery of St. Martin’s, so the _protégé_ of
the latter prelate, Hilary bishop of Chichester, seems to have held
that of Twynham both before and after his elevation to the South-Saxon
see, while the bishops of Exeter, from Osbern the Norman, seem to have
combined the deanery of Bosham with their episcopal office. Maurice
bishop of London (1085) held the deanery of Wimborne. In Normandy,
similarly, Philip of Harcourt, who had been Stephen’s chancellor, was,
as a bishop, dean of the house of Holy Trinity of Beaumont before its
annexation to Bec.
We next come to a writ of the Empress, which must belong to the year
1141, and which similarly recognises Osbert Huitdeniers as the leading
man in London at the time, and, as I maintain, its Justiciar.[279]
Imperatrix Henrici regis filia et Angliæ domina Osberto
Octodenar[ii] et vic[ecomiti] et civibus London[ie] salutem.
Precipio quod saisiatis Henricum episcopum Winton[iensem] et
apostolicæ sedis legatum de domibus illis London[ie] et terris
ubi Petrus ... mansit (quæ pertinent ad decanatum Sancti Martini
London[ie] et ecclesiam suam, et ipsi disseisati sunt), sicut
Rogerus episcopus Saresberiensis decanus ejusdem ecclesiæ et
Fulcherus saisiti fuerunt vivi et mortui, et domos suas, et
omnia quæ inde post mortem Rogeri ablata sunt, facite illi
reddi, et terram ipsam et cetera omnia pertinentia ecclesiæ
Sancti Martini in pace illi tenere facite.
The connection of this great prince-bishop with St. Martin’s leads
me to speak of his striking mandate on the subject of the schools of
London:
H. Dei gratia Wintoniensis ecclesie minister capitulo Sancti
Pauli et Willelmo archidiacono et ministris suis salutem.
Precipio vobis pro obedientia ut trina vocatione sententiam
anatematis in eos proferatis qui sine licentia Henrici Magistri
Scolarum in tota civitate Lundon legere presumpserint preter eos
qui scolas Sancte Marie de Archa et Sancti Martini Magni regunt.
Teste Magistro Ilario apud Wintoniam.[280]
No date is assigned to this charter, for Henry’s long rule at
Winchester lasted till 1171. But my paper on “Hilary bishop of
Chichester”[281] enables us to identify him with “Magister Ilarius”
the witness, and to date the charter as previous not only to 1147,
but also, in all probability, to 1141, by which time he was dean of
Christchurch. This then carries back our charter to the vacancy in the
See of London (1134–1141), which explains the bishop of Winchester
interfering thus forcibly in its affairs.
* * * * *
I have now proved the existence under Stephen, in accordance with
Henry’s charter,[282] of three Justiciars of London, all leading
citizens, namely, Andrew Buchuinte, Osbert Huitdeniers, and Gervase
of Cornhill.[283] But we must not forget the grant of the office to
Geoffrey de Mandeville, earl of Essex, a grant made by Stephen[284]
and confirmed by the Empress. Here again the charters of St. Martin’s
enable us to complete our evidence. For in one of them, issued from
his stronghold the Tower, we find Geoffrey taking, as if he were proud
of it, the style of “Justiciar of London.” We may safely date it 1142–3.
Galfridus dei gratia comes Essex[ie] et Justiciarius London[iæ]
Roberto eadem gratia Londoniensi episcopo et Arch[idiacon]o et
omnibus baronibus et hominibus suis, et omnibus tenentibus et
amicis suis London[iæ] et Essex[iæ] tam clericis quam laicis,
salutem. Quam[285] super modum peccavi, et male vivendo et
bona ecclesiastica præter rationem diripiendo Deum offendi,
ex penitencia mea immerita dampna ecclesiæ Sancti Martini
London[iæ] quodam modo restituere, et voluntati canonicorum
satisfacere proposui, etc....
This curious charter of the dreaded and unscrupulous earl restores to
the canons their Essex manors--
quæ injuste illis ablatæ sunt quietas de operationibus et
auxiliis vic[ecomitis] et plac[itis] sicut melius et liberius et
quietius tenuerunt tempore regis Henrici et postea melius.
Testibus: Rohaisa comitissa uxore mea, et Willelmo archidiacono
London[iensi], et Waltero fratre ipsius, Gregorio clerico, et
Osberto clerico, Willelmo archidiacono,[286] et Willelmo de
Moching,[287] et Ricardo filio Osberti constabulario,[288]
et Gist[289] vic[ecomite], et Ailwino filio Lopstan,[290]
et Roberto de Ponte, et Hugone filio Ulgeri, et Moricio de
Tirtet.[291] Apud London[iam] in Turri, coram monach[is]
Westm[onasterii].
That this charter was wrung from the earl in a passing fit of
repentance, consequent on grave illness, is rendered probable by a
singular document, of which the text was communicated to me by the
bishop of Oxford. It is, unfortunately, imperfect.
Domino ac patri Roberto Dei gratia Londoniensi episcopo et toto
capitulo sancti Pauli et omnibus fidelibus sanctæ Ecclesiæ,
Gaufridus comes de Essexa salutem et debitam obedientiam.
Gratias ago Deo meo qui me oberrantem et jamdudum in Babilonem
lapsum misericorditer revocavit: Quia enim miles ad ecclesiæ
defensionem constitutus fueram, ejus impugnator et crudelissimus
persecutor hactenus ... mei molestia et infirmitate gravatus,
me in matrem meam sanctam eccl ... unde et pœnitens veniam
peto, pollicens et vovens debita satisfactione ... vobis illata
integraliter restituere et pro sensu et facultate ... debitam
reverentiam atque manutenementum et protectionem ... quoque
quæ inter me et reginam fuerat de castello de Sto[rteford]
... [sancto] Paulo clamo quietum in perpetuum. Hujus autem
satisfactionis ... meam et comitissa uxor mea et comes Gast
(_i.e._ Gisl[ebertus]) suam ... confirmationem vero hujus
restitutionis usque ad festum omnium sanctorum ... capituli
catalla nostra in animalibus et ceteris vero pecoribus et ...
rebus quæ in mea bailia sunt vel ad præsens invenientur sine
dilatione vobis reddi faciam.[292]
We will now revert from the crisis of Stephens reign to the years
preceding his accession, when we shall meet with several of those
citizens of whom I have spoken above.
A group of three charters, formerly at Barrington Hall, but now in the
British Museum (Add. Cart. 28, 344–6), brings before us several of the
leading citizens of London at the close of the reign of Henry I. Badly
drawn, as deeds, their meaning, in places, is obscure; but the gist
of them seems to be that certain land in Hertfordshire, which was
held of the Count of Boulogne by ‘Rumoldus’ in Domesday, was given by
‘Rumoldus’ (the same or his namesake), and his sons Payn and Bernard,
to Hugh son of Wulfgar, who was one of the fifteen magnates of the
“English Cnihtengild” of London in 1125.[293] Further, it would seem
that these lands were the dower of Hugh’s sister, who had married one
of Rumold’s sons. The first of these charters[294] records the consent
of Rumold’s lord, William of Boulogne, to this transaction.[295] I
assign it to about the year 1129. First in order among its witnesses
come tenants of the Honour of Boulogne; then local Surrey men;[296] and
lastly, a group recognisable as Londoners:
Gervasio filio Rogeri; Fulcone filio Radulfi; Johanne filio
Radulfi filio Everardi; Hugone Cordello; Guillelmo Gernun;
Gileberto de Sancto Victore; Radulfo de Oxenfordia; Ricardo
Bucherello; Stephano Bucherello; Rogero filio Anschetilli.
Gervase, who had just succeeded his father, a former sheriff of
London, was afterwards eminent as Gervase “of Cornhill” (as son-in-law
of Edward of Cornhill, of the Cnihtengild), Justiciar of London and
sheriff.[297] Fulk pays for his release from imprisonment on the London
pipe roll of 1130;[298] John occurs on the same roll,[299] and was
closely associated with Gervase.[300] Hugh Cordel, in 1130, accounts
for his release from imprisonment;[301] Ralf of Oxford is one of his
pledges.[302] The Bucherells were a great City family, whose name is
said to be preserved in Bucklersbury, and who were doubtless of Italian
origin.[303]
The second of these charters, from its many points of interest, fairly
deserves to be given _in extenso_:
Fulquius vicecomes nepos Gisleberti de Surreia concedit
Hugoni filio Ulgeri et heredibus suis conventiones de terra
de Alfladewicha et de Hischentuna sicut convencio est inter
Bernardum filium Rumoldi et Hugonem filium Ulgeri et sicut
cirographum quod factum est inter eos testatur per iiij marcas
argenti quas dedit mihi Hugo. Et hoc est requisitione Milonis
de Gloecestria et Fulcredi camerarii Lund[onie] et Osberti
VIII denarii et Andree Buccuinte et Anschetilli. Et istud
concessum fuit factum ante Willelmum abbatem de Certesia, et
Ricardum Basset, et Albericum de Ver, et Meinfeninum Britonem,
et Robertum de Talewurda, et Rodbertum dapiferum abbatis de
Certesia, et Walterum clericum, et Radulfum Bloie.[304]
We may safely recognise in the grantor that “Fulcoius qui fuit
vicecomes” of the 1130 Pipe Roll[305] (p. 44), who had, in 1129,
preceded Richard Basset and Aubrey de Ver as sheriff of Surrey,
Cambridgeshire, and Hunts. A church was quitclaimed to the abbot of
Colchester before him as “Fulcquio vicecomite de Surreia,” not later,
it would seem, than 1126.[306] It is probable that the “de Surreia”
of the above clumsily-drawn charter refers to his sheriffwick rather
than to Gilbert, of whom, we here learn, he was the ‘nepos.’ This
statement enables us to connect him directly with Gilbert, a previous
sheriff of Hunts, and, it seems, of Surrey. For a charter witnessed
by this Gilbert, as sheriff, is also witnessed by “Fulcuinus nepos
vicecomitis.”[307] Fulkoin must have been sheriff of Hunts in 1127, for
a charter of May 22, in that year, is witnessed by him.[308] He further
witnessed, as ‘Fulcoinus vicecomes,’ a transaction of which the date
seems not quite certain.[309] Gilbert, his uncle, was sheriff as early
as 1110,[310] and in 1114 (or 1116),[311] and occurs as “Gilbertus
vicecomes de Suthereia” in a charter of 1114–1119.[312]
From this it would seem that he was sheriff, like his nephew, of Surrey
as well as Hunts (including, doubtless, Cambridgeshire). He was also no
other than the founder of Merton Priory, whose Austin canons were the
teachers of Becket.
Having reached this conclusion, I turned to the curious narrative of
the foundation of Merton Priory, which exists in MS. at the College of
Arms.[313] Here we find the striking passage:
Erat autem [Gilbertus] vicecomes trium comitatuum, Suthereie,
scilicet, Cantebrigie, et Huntendonie. In qua videlicet
Huntendona per aliquot jam annos in ecclesia gloriosissime
genetricis Dei Marie canonicorum regularium ordo floruerit
et exemplis bonorum operum odorem sue noticie circumquoque
diffuderit (fo. 1 _d_).
Incidentally, we have here evidence that the Austin Priory of St.
Mary’s, Huntingdon, had been in existence some years before the date of
which the writer was speaking, namely, 1114. But the really important
point is that Gilbert is here asserted to have held the shrievalty
of precisely those three counties, which, from other evidence, I had
concluded to have been subject to his rule. We may, therefore, safely
assert that these three counties, under Henry I., had, for some twenty
years, a single sheriff; first the above Gilbert, and then his nephew
Fulcoin. This is a welcome gleam of light on the administrative system
of Henry I.
But further, the independent confirmation, in this particular, of the
above narrative raises its authority and value. I have seen enough of
it to say that it certainly deserves printing. Apart from its history
of the actual foundation and the early abandonment of the original
site (a point hitherto unknown), it has a long and curious story in
connection with a great council at Winchester in 1121, and, above all,
a precious glimpse of the sheriffs before the Exchequer about the
middle, we may fairly say, of the reign of Henry I.
Ad scacarium autem cum de tota Anglia vicecomites generaliter
coadunarentur universi pro pavore maximo concuterantur, iste
solus interepidis (_sic_) et hillaris adveniebat atque confestim
a receptoribus advocatus pecuniarum inter illos sese mittebat
sic que cum illis q[ui] unus ex illis securus et alacer simul
sedebat (fo. 10 _d_).
Of the persons named in the above charter, “Meinfeninus Brito” was
clearly the “Maenfininus” who, in 1129, had preceded similarly the same
two officers as sheriffs of Bucks and Beds.[314] Miles of Gloucester
was another active royal officer, sheriff in 1129 and 1130 of
Staffordshire and Gloucestershire;[315] so that we have here sheriffs
presiding over seven English counties in 1129. Andrew Buccuinte and
Osbert ‘Huitdeniers’ were successively, as shown in this paper,
Justiciars of London; and Fulcred is of interest as a chamberlain of
London, not mentioned, at least as such, in the Roll of 1130, and only
incidentally named in the MSS. of St. Paul’s.[316] He occurs, however,
under the same style in a Ramsey charter of February 2, 1131 (if it is
not 1130),[317] and was doubtless the Fulcred whose ‘nepos’ Eustace
appears, in 1137, next to Hugh the son of Wulfgar.[318]
VI
The Inquest of Sheriffs (1170)
Several years ago there were discovered at the Public Record Office a
number of parchment scraps relating to East Anglia, evidently belonging
to some group, and of singularly early date. My friend, the late Mr.
Walford Selby, showed them to me at the time, and asked me what I
thought they were. As was announced at the time in the columns of the
‘Athenæum,’[319] I pronounced them to be nothing less than fragments
of original returns to the great ‘Inquest of Sheriffs’ in 1170. Dr.
Stubbs, when editing the text of that document for his well-known
‘Select Charters,’ declared that “the report, if ever it was made, must
have been a record of the most interesting kind conceivable.” It was
believed, however, that no trace of the returns could be found. Mr.
Selby intended to publish these fragments as an interesting appendix
to the ‘Liber Rubeus’; and when Mr. Hall succeeded him as editor, he
printed them as Appendix A.[320] Having studied for himself these
fragments, he rejects their connection with the ‘Inquest of Sheriffs,’
although, as he frankly observes, he has only ventured to do so “with
considerable hesitation.” An entire section of the preface (pp.
cc.-ccxi.) is devoted to his reasons for rejecting the above view and
for advancing a wholly different explanation.
Approaching the question with an open mind, we find the facts to be
as follows: These records relate to an Inquest held, so far as we
can date them, in 1170, and covering the doings of the four years
1166–1170. Moreover, they describe that period as “postquam dominus
Rex transfretavit” (with slight variations in the phrase), which is
precisely the starting-point prescribed for the ‘Inquest of Sheriffs.’
In all this they answer to the Inquest; and all this Mr. Hall admits.
But he raises curiously vague difficulties, which resolve themselves
at last into the assertion--upon which, we read, he must insist--“that
there is nothing more than a superficial resemblance, and certainly
nothing to correspond to the articles of inquiry as they are alone
known to us.” Here at least we have a definite issue. Let us then adopt
the simple plan of printing side by side the second article of enquiry,
from Dr. Stubbs’ text, and the very first of the returns on Mr. Hall’s
list.
ARTICLE. RETURN.
Similiter inquiratur de Hæc est inquisitio de manerio
archiepiscopis, episcopis, Comitis Arundeliæ in Snetesham,
abbatibus, comitibus, baronibus, scilicet quod homines sui
et eorum senescallis et dederunt postquam dominus noster
ministris, quid vel quantum Rex Anglorum extremo
acceperint per terras suas post transfretavit in Normanniam.
terminum praedictum [postquam Quando Comes perexit ad servandas
dominus Rex transfretavit] de les Marches de Wales pluribus
singulis hundredis et de vicibus, scilicet, homines de
singulis villatis suis, et domenio suo dederunt c solidos;
singulis hominibus suis, per et Ricardus filius Atrac et sui
judicium vel sine judicio; et pares de uno socagio dederunt
omnes prisas illas scribant iii marcas gratis....
separatim et causas et Quando comes rediit de Francia,
occasiones earum. iterum dederunt,’ &c., &c.
I have slightly altered Mr. Hall’s punctuation, which seems to me
erroneous; but this in no way affects the argument. It is to the
enquiry I have printed above that these interesting documents are
undoubtedly the returns. Their common feature is that they record
payments made by vills, or by individuals to their lords, that they
record them “separatim,” and that they specially record their “causas
et occasiones.” We may go further. The very phrase in the above
article--“per judicium”[321]--occurs no less than eleven times in the
return for the Valoines barony, being duly appended, as prescribed, to
the several payments and their “causes.”
The correspondence of Inquest and returns being thus close and indeed
obvious, one is led to wonder how their editor can have committed
himself to so unfortunate an assertion. He would seem, instead of
studying the articles, to have started with a preconceived and
erroneous view of their character, and then rejected my own view
because the returns “are not specially connected with the alleged
maladministration of the fiscal officers which was the subject of the
above inquiry, but ... with the private feudal relations of the same
(_i.e._ individual barons) with their subtenants.” He cannot have
read the second article, which is specially concerned with the latter
relations, and which stands in every way on a level with the first
(concerning the fiscal officers). Moreover, by a lucky chance, there
is preserved among these documents at least one fragment of the return
to the enquiry as to the king’s officers. For we read that the men on
one manor “nil dederunt Vicecomiti neque prepositis Regis præter xvi d.
quos dederunt ad castellum firmandum de Oreford,” etc., etc. Nay more,
we can identify at least two of these returns as having been made in
reply to the _third_ article of the Inquest:
Et similiter inquirant de hominibus illis qui post terminum
illum habuerunt alias ballivas de domino rege in custodia, sive
de episcopatu, sive de abbatia, sive de baronia, sive de honore
aliquo vel eschaeta.
The returns numbered 55, 56 (p. cclxxx.) are classed by Mr. Hall among
“Baroniæ incertæ.” They relate, however, to the barony or “honour”
of William Fitz Alan, which had been for many years in the king’s
hands. It was ‘farmed’ in 1170, as it had been for ten years, by Guy
l’Estrange (“Wido Extraneus.”) Guy had a brother John,[322] who appears
in these returns as in charge of the Norfolk portion of the honour.
Since Michaelmas, 1165, a part of William Fitz Alan’s land had been
granted out to Geoffrey de Vere, and we accordingly find, at the end of
the second return, one of William Fitz Alan’s knights,[323] William de
Pagrave, making him a payment. Now all this might have been explained
by an intelligent editor. Mr. Hall has elaborated, instead, a series of
fantastic errors.
I have dwelt on the point at some length, because, apart from the
intrinsic interest of these curious returns--which have thus come
to light after more than seven centuries--they establish the fact
that this great enquiry extended to private landowners, a fact which
even Dr. Stubbs, I fear, seems to have overlooked in the analysis he
gives of the ‘Inquest.’ And further, they corroborate the articles of
enquiry, where we can apply the test, and thus confirm the authenticity
of the document in which those articles are found.
* * * * *
We must not, however, ignore Mr. Hall’s own hypothesis, for the Rolls
edition in which it is enshrined gives it an official _cachet_;
and there may be those who think that arguments of this character
require an answer.
So far as it is possible to understand it, this hypothesis would
connect these Inquests with the scutage of Ireland (p. ccx.), which was
duly accounted for (_annotatum_) in 1172, the expedition falling within
the financial year Mich., 1171–Mich., 1172.[324] In that case these
inquests, on Mr. Hall’s own showing, could not have been held earlier
than 1172, at “the conclusion of the campaign” (p. clxxxvi.). But they
must have been held in 1170, for, as he observes (pp. ccxi.), one of
the fragments speaks of “istos iiij annos” (p. cclxviii.) reckoned from
March, 1166.
But we have much stronger evidence than this. We read, at the outset,
of these documents, that “it will be evident that they are connected
with some Inquest of military service during the reign of Henry II.”
This is an extraordinary assertion from one who is himself their
editor. For we have only to turn to the second on the list to find in
it nothing but a detailed record of the sums given individually by some
forty burgesses of (Castle) Rising towards paying off the mortgages of
their lord the earl of Arundel, who was clearly in the hands of the
Jews. And the long and most curious return from the barony of Robert
de Valoines deals with a humble reeve who neglected his master’s hay;
a shepherd who had charge of his lord’s fold; Brian, who looked after
the wood; Gilbert, who kept the bees; and other dependents fined for
negligence. We may even say, most confidently, that the idea of an
Inquest of military service could never occur to any one who perused
the whole of these documents with an unbiassed mind. They are simply
the result of an enquiry into the payment of moneys, and the reasons
for such payment. But Mr. Hall has a theory to advance, and can only
see these records in its light. Briefly stated, that theory is that
these documents “answer very nearly to the description of such an
Inquest” on knight service as is referred to in the return for the
Honour of Arundel assigned to 1166. That these documents are later in
date; that they do not suggest an Inquest on knight service; that,
even if they did, they have no concern with an Inquest restricted to
a Sussex Honour--all these objections are as nothing to Mr. Hall. He
is as ready to “hazard the supposition” that conflicts with all the
evidence as he was loth to accept a solution that fits in every way
the facts of the case. May one not raise a strong protest against the
sacrifice of a dozen pages, within a strictly limited space, to the
enunciation of wildly conjectural and absolutely erroneous theories,
not in the book of a private author, but in a Government publication,
intended to form for all time the standard edition of a famous work?
Let us now turn to the Pipe Roll of 1172 (18 Hen. II.), which plays an
important part in Mr. Hall’s arguments. He tells us that
an entry occurs in several different counties which has proved
a source of difficulty to several generations of historical
students. The entry in question is headed “De hiis qui cartas
non miserunt,” certain assessments being appended in each case
for the Scutage of Ireland (p. ccii.).
We refer, as invited, to the roll itself, only to find that, on
the contrary, it first records the “assessments for the scutage of
Ireland,” and then heads the lists which follow: “De his qui cartas
non miserunt.”[325] It is this very sequence that is responsible for
the error of Madox, who held, as Mr. Hall observes, “that the charters
in question must have been returned for the purpose of the Scutage of
Ireland in 1171.”[326] Swereford, on the other hand, wrote of the 1172
roll:
Quo quidem rotulo supplentur nomina illorum qui cartas non
miserunt anno xiij^o, prout superius tactum est (p. 8).
He is wrong, of course, in stating that the charters were returned
in the “13th year” (an error which his editor carefully ignores),
but perfectly right in his explanation, if we substitute “12th” for
his “13th” year. Yet, having thus rightly shown that Swereford’s
explanation is the true one, his editor closes the paragraph thus:
The simple solution of the difficulty is that the tenants who
were in debt for the aid of 1168 were so entered on the occasion
of the next assessment (1171) in a conspicuous form (p. cciii.).
Really, this wanton confusion is enough to make Swereford turn in his
grave. The entry which has caused the difficulty refers, not to “the
tenants who were in debt for the aid” of 1168, but to those who had
made no returns (“cartas non miserunt”) in 1166.
Mr. Hall assigns Madox’s error to his finding no “corresponding
entries,” under Sussex, in 1168 (14 Hen. II.) for those in 1172 (18
Hen. II.). And yet all three entries, in the latter year, of the
earl of Arundel’s tenants[327] have their corresponding entries in
1168.[328] The real cause of Madox’s error has been explained above.
It is, we read, “significant” that in 1168 the earl’s “assessment
actually does not correspond with that recorded in the existing charter
of 1166” (p. cciv.); for it only “gives 84½ fees for the Earl’s Sussex
barony,” while the Inquest referred to in his charter had the result
that “13 more were acknowledged by the Earl as chargeable upon his
demesne, raising the total to 97½.” Therefore, “we are almost tempted
to suspect that the Earl’s charter was not returned in 1166 at all, but
only after an interval of several years.” On which, of course, a theory
is built.
Ingenious enough, is it not? Yet, as usual, a house of cards. For we
find the “barony” charged only with 84½ fees in 1194,[329] in 1196, and
in 1211 (13 John),[330] precisely as in 1168. The total had not been
raised at all; and the house of cards topples over.
The same unhappy paragraph closes with these words:
It is quite clear ... that the dispute was practically settled,
in the 18th year, only two refractory tenants remaining to be
dealt with, and that the Earl paid the whole of his assessment
in the 21st year.
We turn to the rolls, and find, as usual, that not two, but three,
tenants (_ut supra_) were recalcitrant in the 18th year, and that the
Earl, in the 21st (1175), did not pay a penny of his assessment (84½
fees), but was forgiven the whole of it.[331]
Not content with his own confusion, Mr. Hall proceeds to assign to
others errors which they neither have made, nor would dream of making.
He even asserts that Mr. Eyton and I “maintain that the honour of
Arundel was granted to William de Albini by Henry I.” (p. ccvii.), an
assertion for which there is not the faintest shadow of foundation.
Such a view would imply an absolute ignorance of all the facts of the
case; and it was as foreign to Mr. Eyton[332] as it is to myself.[333]
One cannot be expected to waste time over his theory that the baronies
mentioned in these fragments were specially involved in debt, which is
a mere phantasy; but we may note, as the date is of importance, that
“Avelina de Ria” was “compelled to atone” for her offence, in making
her son a knight, by a heavy fine, not “in the 15th year,” but in the
14th.[334] In the same paragraph (p. ccx.) we are told that “this
barony, like the honour of Arundel, was still unable to contribute
towards the next Scutage, of 1171.”[335] As a matter of fact, it paid
at once £30, out of £35, the total for which it was liable,[336] a very
creditable proportion; while the honour of Arundel was not even charged
with any payment for this Scutage, which was only assessed on those
“qui nec abierunt in Hybernia,” etc.
But enough of this error and confusion. If the reader is tempted to
grow weary, what must be the feelings of the writer, who has thus to
remove, brick by brick, this vast edifice of error, so perversely
and wantonly erected, before the simple facts can be brought to the
light of day. It is weary, it is thankless work; and yet it has to be
accomplished. I am tempted to quote these apposite remarks from the
critical articles by Mr. Thomas Bond on a no less misleading work:
Numberless difficulties are suggested where none really exist,
and possibilities and probabilities unaccompanied by proofs
are offered for their solution.... The narrative is so diluted
and confused that it is difficult to follow it shortly and
comprehensively. I can, therefore, only select some of the most
remarkable errors and notice them _seriatim_, quoting the
author’s own words in order to avoid the risk of unintentional
misrepresentation.... It may be asked, Where is the difficulty
which requires these strange, far-fetched ‘probabilities’ for
its solution?... All this is fanciful and mere imagination....
In reply to all these supposed ‘possibilities,’ let us turn to
certainties.... I have thus laid before the reader some of the
numerous inaccuracies into which the author of this work has
fallen, and have stated some of the singular theories he has
advanced.[337]
We have, in the Red Book Preface, the very same features. It is,
perhaps, in his treatment of these interesting fragments (1170) that
we detect most vividly Mr. Hall’s strange capacity of inventing
difficulties that do not exist, and of dismissing those that do. In
the teeth of the clearest possible facts, we are given such vague
probabilities, or possibilities, as these:
This will perhaps be ... it is probable that ... it can only be
surmised that ... we are almost tempted to suspect that ... we
may perhaps hazard the supposition that ... would probably have
been ... it might be held that ... we might perhaps identify,
etc., etc. (pp. ccii.-ccvi.).
The fact is that, as I have said, this preface is really the fruit
of a habit of mind, a mental twist, which distorts the writer’s
vision, and seems to impel him, irresistibly, to arrive at the wrong
conclusion.[338] We trace this singular tendency throughout, but its
effect has nowhere proved more disastrous than in his treatment of
these returns to the great “Inquest of Sheriffs.” That these records
should have been so treated in the first work that gives them to the
world is a really lamentable matter.
VII
The Conquest of Ireland[339]
A brilliant but paradoxical writer--I refer to Mr. Standish
O’Grady--has, with unerring hand, sketched for us the state of
Ireland when as yet the Norman adventurer had not set foot upon her
shores.[340] To those who dream of a golden age, of a land in the
enjoyment of peace and happiness till invaded by the ruthless stranger,
the scene his pen reveals should prove a rude awakening. That Mr.
O’Grady writes with unrivalled knowledge of his subject, is neither
his only nor his chief claim to the confidence of those we speak of:
they are more likely to be influenced by the fact that his sympathies
are all with the Irish, that he cannot conceal his admiration for
government by ‘battle-axe,’ and that he strives to justify what to
English eyes could be nothing but a glorified Donnybrook Fair. He is
wrathful with Mr. Freeman for picturing Ireland as only “the scene of
waste tribal confusions, aimless flockings and fightings, a wilderness
tenanted by wolves and wolfish men,” and claims that her history, in
each generation, was at this time “that of some half-dozen strong men
striving for the mastery ... a most salutary warfare, inevitable,
indispensable, enjoined by nature herself.”
No! Freedom, whose smile we shall never resign,
Go, tell our invaders, the Danes,
That ’tis sweeter to bleed for an age at thy shrine
Than to sleep but a moment in chains.
If we cannot agree with this able champion in viewing the warfare he
describes as a healthy process of evolution, we may at least gladly
admit that some knowledge of this dark period, lighted only by the
lurid torch of rapine and internecine strife, is as essential to a
right understanding of the Anglo-Norman settlement as is the study
of English history, for some generations before the Conquest, the
necessary prelude to a comprehension of the Norman Conquest itself.
It is not, however, for the Conquest only that this knowledge of the
true state of Ireland ought to be acquired. The light it throws on
the Irish people, their inherited and unchangeable tendencies, is of
value from the parallel it presents to the latest modern developments.
“Tribes and nations,” writes Mr. O’Grady, “had ceased to count”; the
struggle was one in which, “released from all control,” some half a
dozen rival kings “fiercely battled like bulls for the mastery of the
herd.” No lively imagination, surely, is required to see the spirit
of this strife renewed in the leaders of the present Irish party,
or prophesy a revival, under Home Rule, of the days when “Turlough
O’Conor and Tiernan O’Rourke were terribly at war--Ireland (the
chronicler adds) a shaking sod between them.” Although, in the true
Hibernian spirit, Mr. Standish O’Grady can speak of this as a “vast and
bloody, but not ignoble strife,” I hold that its animating spirit was
an ambition as ruthlessly personal as that which leads the Presidents
of South American Republics to wade through blood to power, and to
reduce their country to ‘a shaking sod’ for the gratification of their
rivalry. It is the absolutely personal character of this strife which
is fatal to Mr. O’Grady’s argument that a strong ‘Ardriship,’ or
central rule, was in actual process of evolution before the invaders
arrived. Where that rule was based only on personal prowess or strength
of character, it was liable, at any moment, to be broken up by death,
and once more replaced, if not by anarchy, at least by such internecine
strife as has been the fate of Mr. Parnell’s party since the removal of
his strong hand. There was, as Mr. O’Grady is never tired of reminding
us, but one way, in those halcyon days, of securing the hegemony
of Ireland: “a normal Irish king had to clear his way through the
provinces, battle-axe in hand, gathering hostages by the strength of
his arm”; he had to “move forward step by step, battle-axing territory
after territory into submission.” The only vote known was given by
“the mouth of the battle-axe”; and for the dissentient Irishmen of the
time there were “always ready battle-axes and trained troops of swift
raiders and plunderers.” Nor was it necessary for the Irish king to set
his “trained plunderers and cattle drivers” at work on every occasion.
The convenient and recognised institution of hostages provided him
with some one he could hang or blind without the least trouble, and
thus anticipate the fate which might very probably be his own.
Remember the glories of Brian the brave,
Though the days of the hero are o’er.
Even the danger of interference from without could not permanently
unite the Irish among themselves. The Scandinavian settlers had turned
this weakness to account by siding now with one and now with another of
the factions, and had finally made good their possession of the seaport
towns, where they stood towards the rest of the island much like the
Ulstermen of to-day, a hardy race of alien origin and long of hostile
faith, merchants and seamen to whom the natives left all the traffic
with other lands. One cannot but think from the small part they seem to
have played in the struggle between the Irish and the Norman invaders
that their heart was rather in trading than in war, and that the old
wiking spirit had flickered down among them, or at least found a new
vent. Not so with the Norman adventurers. That marvellous people had as
yet preserved their restless activity, their boundless ambition, and
their love of martial enterprise. Conquerors, courtiers, or crusaders,
they were always lords in the end; the glamour of lordship was ever
present above the Norman horizon. Ireland alone knew them not, and
thither they had now begun to cast eager eyes. The wave that had spread
itself over England and Wales had now gathered up its strength anew,
and the time had come for it at last to break on the Irish shore.
It is at this point that the curious poem Mr. Orpen has so ably edited
comes to our aid as an historical authority of singular value and
importance. Although long known to scholars from Michel’s publication
of its text (1837), it was described by Mr. Dimock, who knew its value,
in the preface to his edition of Giraldus, as then “in great measure
useless” from the want of competent annotation. He observed with truth
that “no more valuable contribution, perhaps, to the history of the
first few years of the English invasion of Ireland could be made” than
a worthy edition of this poem. Such an edition Mr. Orpen may justly
claim to have produced. The corrupt and obscure condition of the text
demanded elucidation no less urgently than the Irish names with which
it teems required special knowledge for their correct identification.
It is not too much to say that Mr. Orpen has shown us how much can be
done by skilful editing to increase the value of an authority. Avoiding
the over-elaboration that one associates with German scholarship, he
has provided his readers with an apparatus at once sufficient and
concise. Text, translation, notes, map, chronology, and glossary, all
are admirable in their way; and the patience with which the barbarous
names, both of places and of persons, have been examined and explained
is deserving of warm praise. As to the way in which a text should be
treated scholars will generally differ in certain points of detail, but
Mr. Orpen’s method shows us, at least, the exact state of the text from
which he worked. There is still room, perhaps, for further conjectural
emendation. For instance, in the lines--
Crandone pus a un barun,
Ricard le flemmeng out anun--
where the editor is fairly baffled by ‘Crandone,’ perfect sense might
at once be made by reading--
Slan donat pus a un barun,
which would satisfy at once the conditions of metre, of locality, and
of the context. So too, in the interesting Lacy charter printed on page
310, the editor might have detected in Adam de ‘Totipon,’ the Adam de
‘Futepoi’ of Giraldus, and the Adam de ‘Feipo’ of the poem: in records
the name appears in both forms. The case of this man, one may add,
is peculiarly interesting, because I have detected him as a knightly
tenant of Hugh de Laci in England in the returns of 1166, in which he
seems to be disguised as “Putipo.” He thus came, we see, to share in
his lord’s greatness, becoming one of the leading ‘barons’ in his new
dominion of Meath.
It is necessary to explain that although this poem, in the form here
preserved to us, dates only from about 1220 to 1230, it enshrines
materials contemporary with the actual invasion and conquest. For it
is based upon a narrative which seems to have closed not later than
1176, and for which the _trouvère_ or compiler of the poem was indebted
to Maurice Regan, the interpreter, and, one might almost say, the
diplomatic agent of king Dermot, whose matrimonial adventures were the
_causa causans_ of the whole story. In giving to the poem the name of
“the Song of Dermot and the Earl,” the editor has brought out the fact
that its narrative is chiefly concerned with the doings of Dermot and
his son-in-law, ‘Strongbow,’ as the earl of Pembroke has been commonly
named.[341] It is not improbable that the original work was only
carried down to the earl’s death in 1176. Mr. Orpen lays special stress
on the fact that there are but “two allusions pointing to a much later
date,” and claims it as “a remarkable fact that, with the exception of
these two allusions ... there is nothing, so far as I have observed,
pointing to a later date than 1177.” He would seem, however, to have
overlooked an allusion to John de Curci’s subsequent troubles in Ulster
in the lines:
De curti out anun iohan,
Ki pus isuffri meint [a]han.
This, however, like the other two, would be only an addition by the
later versifier, and does not affect the main fact that we are dealing
with a metrical version of a story contemporaneous with the conquest,
and enshrining in ll. 3064–3177 “the only connected account of the
subinfeudation of Leinster and Meath ... that has come down to us, a
sort of original Domesday Book of the first Anglo-Norman settlement.”
As such, it has the advantage of date over the ‘Expugnatio’ of
Giraldus; it is also instinct with evidence of native local knowledge;
and, above all, it stands apart from any other authority in its
independent point of view. Giraldus wrote, as is well known, largely
with the object of glorifying his relatives, who made the invasion of
Ireland almost a family undertaking; in Regan, on the other hand, we
have the panegyrist of Dermot and the earl of Pembroke, who carried to
such a height the spirit of party faction as to denounce as “traitors”
all his countrymen who were opposed to Dermot and his foreign allies.
The opening lines are, unfortunately, imperfect and so obscure that
the nature of the materials from which the _trouvère_ worked
and the exact share in their authorship due to Regan have been, and
must remain, to some extent matters of conjecture. Mr. Orpen himself
inclines to the belief that Regan supplied the unknown _trouvère_
with a tale already “put into metre”; but Dr. Liebermann has rightly
urged the improbability of our poem being merely an adaptation of
one previously composed. Indeed, that eminent scholar has advanced a
theory of his own, namely, that the real original source was a “lost
chronicle” about the conquest of Ireland which Giraldus Cambrensis
had used in 1188 for his Expugnatio.’ And this theory he bases on
some striking parallel passages.[342] To the few typical parallels
adduced by Dr. Liebermann I would myself add some taken from the
stirring tale of the saving of Dublin when, mad for revenge, the ousted
Northmen assembled from all the isles of the north to regain their
lost dominion. This sudden upleaping, for a moment, of the old wiking
flame was but a splendid anachronism: like the Highland rising of the
‘forty-five,’ it was curiously out of date. Yet the old Scandinavian
spirit, if dulled among the traders of Dublin, still burnt in the hardy
rovers they had now summoned to their aid; and the Irish chieftain who
stood aloof watching with his men the surging fray as the little band
of Anglo-Normans strove to repel the onslaught, saw not merely rival
conquerors, quarrelling, like vultures, for the spoil, but deadly foes
whose own lives hung on the issue of that fight. But while in a fit of
‘berserker’ fury, ‘John the Mad’ led the attack against the eastern
gate, Richard de Cogan, the governor’s brother, had privily sallied
from another one:--
Este vus Johan le deue Duce Johanne agnomine
Vers dyuelyn tut serre, the Wode ... viri
Vers la cite od sa gent bellicosi ... ordinatis
En dreite la porte del orient, turmis ad portam orientalem
* * * * muros invadunt.
La cite unt dunc asaillie.
Then, marching round till he reached the rear of the assailants, he
fell on them suddenly with a mighty shout, and the Northmen, caught
between his brother and himself, wavered at last in their attack. The
Danish axe still whirled in the hands of ‘John the Mad,’ cleaving its
way, as of old, through helm and coat of mail:
De une hache ben tempre Militis quoque coxa ferro
Cosuit le ior un chevaler utrinque vestita uno securis
Que la quisse lui fist voler; ictu cum panno loricæ præcisa.
Od tut la hache de fer blanc
Lui fist voler la quisse al
champe.
But John himself fell at last; and the sons of the wikings fled to
their ships. Hasculf, their king, captured alive, hurled at his captors
words of scorn, and was by them promptly beheaded, “pur son orgoil e
ses fous dis,” or, as Giraldus tersely puts it, “insolenti verbo.”
If Dr. Liebermann’s theory be accepted, it would involve, as he
reminds us, the important consequence that we have in our poem and the
‘Expugnatio’ not two independent authorities, but narratives drawn from
a common source. The discrepancies, however, between the two are so
numerous and so significant that we cannot accept this new view as at
all satisfactorily proved.
But turning to a third source of information, known as “the Book of
Howth,” I have no hesitation in saying that its nature has been quite
misunderstood. It is difficult to render clear, within a short compass,
the hopeless confusion that surrounds the subject, and that is,
virtually, all to be traced to an error of that ardent collector, but
most untrustworthy antiquary, Sir George Carew, whose voluminous MSS.
at Lambeth include both the ‘Regan’ poem and the Book of Howth, and to
whom we should have felt more grateful if he would only have left them
alone. But the worst offender was Professor Brewer, whose work it is
the fashion to rate very highly indeed, though I have found it by no
means unimpeachable even in his calendars of the state papers of Henry
VIII.[343] Now the Professor ought to have been quite at home on this
Irish subject, for it fell to his lot to edit the first four volumes
of Giraldus as well as the Book of Howth; yet he not only stereotyped
and carried further Carew’s original error, but found fault, somewhat
unjustly, with Mr. Dimock’s remarks in his preface to the ‘Expugnatio.’
The real facts of the case are these. So popular were the works of
‘Master Gerald,’ as Mr. Dimock observed, that they survive, not only
in many MSS., but in several early translations. The pedigree of these
translations has not been properly worked out. At Trinity College,
Dublin, we have two in E. 3, 31, and F. 4, 4, while at Lambeth we have
the so-called ‘Conquest of Ireland’ by Bray--published by Messrs.
Brewer and Bullen, with the Book of Howth--and in the latter (pp.
36–117) there is included another and more modernized version. Of these
the one assigned to Bray was held by Professor Brewer to have been
written about the end of the 14th or beginning of the 15th century,
and to be “so interesting and curious a specimen of English as spoken
in the Pale” that he decided to print it in full and to retain the
original orthography. But E. 3, 31 was, he admitted, “a still earlier
version.” Yet this latter MS., when submitted by Mr. Dimock to so
competent an authority as Mr. Earle, was pronounced by him to be “a
truly interesting specimen of fifteenth (_sic_) century Hibernian
English.” He added that it well deserved publication, in which remark I
certainly concur, its language being most curious. Professor Brewer (p.
xxiii.) declared it “an error” of Mr. Dimock and others to term this
MS. a translation of Giraldus, but the real error, we shall find, was
his own. The other Dublin MS. (F. 4, 4), to which he does not allude,
is assigned by Mr. Dimock to “the sixteenth century” (p. lxxvii.), and
declared to be “a transcript from the earlier E. 3, 31,” a description
which, unfortunately, misses the point. The solution, I believe, of
the whole mystery is that there was a very early and exceedingly free
translation of Gerald’s ‘Expugnatio,’ which, after the mediæval
fashion, spoke of him at times in the third person, and thus assumed,
in places, a quasi-original form. This original translation, which
seems to be now lost, was copied both by the writer of E. 3, 31 and by
Bray in his ‘Conquest of Ireland,’ the latter only modernizing somewhat
the language. Then come the two other MSS., both of the latter part of
the 16th century. Of these the distinctive feature is that while still
copying, though further modernizing, the original translation--for
internal evidence seems to prove that the Book of Howth at least
was derived from neither of the above copies--they interlard it
with certain passages taken from another and distinct source. This
discovery, which corrects Mr. Dimock and overthrows the conclusions of
Professor Brewer, is based on collation of the essential passage in the
Book of Howth with its parallel passage in the Dublin MS. F. 4, 4 as
given in Hardy’s ‘Catalogue of Manuscripts relating to the History of
Great Britain,’ on the authority of Mr. W. M. Hennessy:
BOOK OF HOWTH. TRIN. COLL. MS. F. 4, 4.
This much Cameransse left out This much Camerans left out of
in his book aforesaid with other his book ... with other things
things, more for displeasure more for displeasure than any
than any truth to tell, the truth to tell, the cause before
cause afore doth testifie. God do testifie, God forgive them all.
forgive them all. This much that This much that is in this book
is in this book more than more than Camerans did writ of
Camerans did write of was was translated by the Primet
translated by the Primate Dowdall in the yere of o^r Lord
Doudall in the year of our God 1551 out of a Latin book
Lord 1551 out of a Latin book into English, which was found
into English, which was found with O’Neil in Armaghe.
with O’Nell in Armaghe.
Nothing can be more clear than this reference to the interlarded
portions, which can all, I may add, be identified and separated from
the ‘Giraldus’ portion. But Carew carelessly wrote, in the margin
on fo. 6, that the _whole_ narrative “was translated out of an old
book of O’Neale’s written in Latin, and put into English by Dowdall,
Primate of Ardmaghe, beginning in anno 1167.” Though Professor Brewer
had the words of the original before him, and though he could not but
admit that Bray “follows closely the footsteps of Giraldus,” yet he
was so misled by Carew’s unlucky slip as to assert that the MS. E. 3,
31 was “nothing more than a translation of the Latin chronicle once
in O’Neil’s possession, which Carew calls ‘the Conquest of Ireland,
written by Thomas Bray’” (p. xxiii.). These, on the contrary, are
precisely the versions which have no interpolations from that source.
The Armagh book was devoted to the deeds of John de Courcy, Conqueror
of Ulster, though, by a crowning error, Professor Brewer was careful
to distinguish it from “A Chronicle of the Gests or Doings of John de
Courcey, Earl of Ulster.” Apart from the interest of its contents,
the “book” has a special importance from a significant allusion by
Giraldus, when closing his chapter on John, who was never, by the way,
“Earl of Ulster”:
Sed hæc de Johanne summatim, et quasi sub epilogo commemorantes,
grandiaque ejusdem gesta suis explicanda scriptoribus
relinquentes, etc., etc.
Having now cleared up all this confusion, I need not dwell on Professor
Brewer’s further failure to detect the share taken by Christopher lord
of Howth in the compilation of the book that bears the name of his
house, but will resume our discussion of the Anglo-Norman poem.
Although, as I have said, the nature of the materials supplied to
this 13th century _trouvère_ must remain as yet conjectural, the
question is of some literary interest in its bearing on the relation
of the ‘Carmen Ambrosii’ to the ‘Itinerarium Peregrinorum,’ if not to
the chronicle of Richard of Devizes, in which cases, by a converse
process, we find a French poem utilized by a Latin chronicler. It is
the plausible suggestion of M. Paul Meyer that the _trouvère_
to whom we owe this poem composed it by desire of the countess of
Pembroke, daughter of the earl, and granddaughter of Dermot, just as
the great ‘Marshal’ poem, now in course of publication, was written for
the glorification of her husband’s family.[344] That the writer was
a Pembrokeshire man is rendered extremely probable by his evidently
close acquaintance with that district, and his recognition of the
Flemish element in ‘little England beyond Wales.’ A curious test of his
accuracy is afforded by his mention of the king’s departure for Ireland:
Li rei henri, quant eskipa,
A la croiz en mer entra.
It is a warning to the critical school of historians that Miss Norgate
very naturally supposed the poet to have here mistaken Crook, in
Waterford harbour, where Henry disembarked, for the place where he
took ship. Mr. Orpen has shown conclusively, from records, that the
‘croix’ was the usual place of embarkation for those leaving Pembroke
for Ireland. We have thus a peculiar feature of the poem in its
combination of the Irish knowledge possessed by the original informant
with the acquaintance of its later versifier with men and places in
that district from which the adventurers had so largely come.
Among the points on which this poem gives us special information we
may note its mention of a man who played no small part in the royal
administration of Ireland.[345] We read that, on the coming of king
Henry,--
Willame le fiz audeline
Od lui vint a cel termine (ll. 2603–4).
Belonging to the same type as the men whom the first Henry had steadily
raised to office and to power as a check upon the turbulent feudal
nobility, William was called upon to play a similar part in Ireland
as the representative of the royal power among the eager adventurers
who had flocked to the land of promise. Hence their bitter complaints
against his rule to the king, and the violent criticism of his personal
character to which Giraldus gave utterance from the point of view of
his kinsmen. Now Professor Tout rejects the statement, in the two lines
we have quoted, that William came with the king, and infers from the
‘Gesta’ that Henry had despatched him some time before from Normandy to
govern till he came. But there is evidence--though unknown, it would
seem, to historians--that throws fresh light upon the question. Mr.
Eyton, in his ‘Court and Itinerary’ of the king, could not discover
any document belonging to his stay at Pembroke (29th September to 16th
October), while waiting to cross to Ireland. It was there, however,
on the 7th of October (as the date is, in this case, given) that he
granted a charter to the men of Maldon,[346] from which we learn that
with him at the time were the earls of Cornwall and Clare (Hertford),
Roger Bigod, three of his ‘dapiferi,’ or household officers, William
Ruffus, Alvred de St. Martin, and William Fitz Audelin, with two men,
Hugh de Gundeville and Robert Fitz Bernard, whom he took with him to
Ireland and left there. It is clear then that if William Fitz Audelin
and Robert Fitz Bernard met him on landing at Waterford, they can only
have preceded him, at most, by a few days. This discovery vindicates
the virtual accuracy of the poem.
Mr. Eyton’s work, to which I have referred, records (p. 165) another
charter of interest for its date. It belongs to Henry’s stay at
Wexford, in March, 1172, on his way back to England. As only the first
two witnesses were known to Mr. Eyton, a full list may here be appended
as illustrating the king’s _entourage_ on this expedition.
Testibus; Comite Ricardo filio Gilberti; Willelmo de Braosa;
Willelmo de Albin[eio];[347] Reginaldo de Cortenay; Hugone de
Gundevilla; Willelmo filio Aldelini dapifero; Hugone de Cresy;
Willelmo de Stotevilla; Radulfo de Aya (_sic_); Reginaldo
de Pavily; Radulfo de Verdun; Willelmo de Gerpunvilla; Roberto
de Ruilli; Apud Wesefordam.[348]
Turning now to other subjects, one of the most curious allusions in
this poem is that which refers to the practice of tendering a folded
glove as a gage for waging one’s law. Maurice de Prendergast is accused
of treason in protecting the king of Ossory from the perfidy of his
foes:
E Morice a sun guant plee,
A son seignur lad baille,
Quen sa curt ad dressereit
De quant quil mespris aueit.
Asez lunt replegeez
De vassals engleis alosez.
So, too, when Robert Fitz Stephen was brought as a traitor before king
Henry:
Le fiz estephene pleia sun guant
Al rei le tendi meintenant:
De quantque lui sauerat retter
Lui vodrat robert adrescer
En sa curt mult uolenters
Par la garde de tuz sez pers.
Asez le plegerent errant
Franceis, flamengs e normand.
Mr. Orpen aptly quotes the case of the dying Roland, when ‘por ses
pechiez Dieu porofrit lo guant,’ and refers us to ‘vadium in duello,’
and ‘plicare vadia’ in Du Cange. But the most instructive remarks on
this custom will be found in Professor Maitland’s introduction to
precedents for the Court Baron.[349] The formula he finds for this
antique wager runs thus: “He shall wage his law with his folded glove
(_de sun guant plyee_) and shall deliver it into the hand of the
other, and then take his glove back and find pledge for his law.”
The learned, writer explains that the folded glove typified that
chattel of value which “in very old times” was the _vadium_, _wed_,
or gage constituting the contract, and that this was now supplanted
by a contract with sureties, who had become the real security for
the party’s appearance in court. This procedure, it will be seen, is
brought out in our poem, which was written about a century earlier
than the treatise Mr. Maitland quotes. The mention here, I may add, of
“his peers,” and the phrase, as Mr. Orpen points out, ‘Li reis receut
le cors’ (l. 2635) suggest surely that the writer of the poem had a
special knowledge of legal formulas.
The careful reader will detect also a constitutional hint in the
summons to the tenants by knight service to come to the assistance of
king Henry in the rebellion of 1173:
Chevalers, baruns e meyne,
_A chescun barun par sei_,
Par le commandement le rei,
Que tuz passassent la mer
En normandie li reis aider.
For we see here an allusion to that special summons, to which,
whether for council or for war, each ‘baron’ was entitled. One of the
grievances of Becket, it may be remembered, at Northampton was that
he had not been summoned ‘par sei,’ but only through the sheriff.
Perhaps, however, the most important contribution made by this poem
to institutional history is found in that most important passage, ll.
3064–3177, which the editor describes as “a sort of original Domesday
Book of the first Anglo-Norman settlement,” and as presenting all
the appearance of being, in substance, a contemporary account. For,
apart from its obvious value as “the only connected account of the
subinfeudation of Leinster and Meath by earl Richard Fitz Gilbert and
Hugh de Laci, respectively,” it affords a very striking confirmation
of the new theory on knight service advanced by me in the pages of
the ‘English Historical Review,’ in which, as against the accepted
view maintained by Dr. Stubbs and Mr. Freeman, I contended that the
_quota_ of knight service was determined not by the area of the fief,
but by “the unit of the feudal host,” and is therefore reckoned in
round numbers, and is almost invariably a multiple of 5, if not of
10.[350] I proved this to be the case for England, and appealed to
the Irish evidence as confirming the discovery. But I did not quote
this remarkable passage, from which we learn that in Meath--which
Henry had granted to Hugh de Lacy for the service of fifty knights (l.
2730)--Richard Fleming was enfeoffed to serve with twenty knights, and
Gilbert de Nugent (as we learn from charter evidence) with five; while
in Leinster, which the Earl, as we learn from charters, held by the
service of a hundred knights, Maurice de Prendergast received his fief
“pur dis [10] chevalers servise,” Walter de Riddlesford was bound to
furnish twenty knights, and a certain Reginald was assigned fifteen as
his quota. Our confidence in the poem is increased by the fact that
it names fifty knights as the service due from Meath, which we know
to be correct, while so good an authority as the ‘Gesta’ makes it a
hundred. The whole of this curious passage is ably annotated by Mr.
Orpen, and the puzzling place-names identified. But, familiar though he
clearly is with almost every source of information, he would seem to
be unacquainted with the valuable Gormanston Register, which contains,
I believe, a transcript (fo. 190 _a_) of the actual charter by which
earl Richard granted to Maurice Fitz Gerald Naas and Wicklow (ll.
3085–92)--the former for the service of five knights.[351] The same
Register has copies of three charters (fos. 5_b_, 188_b_), showing how
the lands spoken of in the poem as granted to Gilbert de Nangle came,
under Richard I., to Walter de Lacy, who granted them in turn to his
brother Hugh.
The comparative ease and rapidity with which a handful of adventurers
had parcelled out among themselves the most fertile portions of the
island is perhaps the most surprising feature of the whole story. It
is certain that the native Irish were by no means wanting in courage;
indeed, they were then, as they always have been, only too ready
to fight. Their weapons were good and were skilfully wielded; but
like the wild Celts of Galloway, who had hurled themselves in vain,
at the Battle of the Standard, against a line of mailed warriors,
they scorned the use of defensive armour. Their mode of warfare was
essentially suited to woods and bogs and passes, while their assailants
were accustomed, from continental warfare, to cavalry actions in the
open. Combining the evidence of our poem with that of Master Gerald,
we can see clearly that, as in so many decisive encounters, from
Hastings itself to Culloden, the issue turned on the conflict of
wholly differing tactics. Precisely as at Hastings, the Normans--now
the Anglo-Normans--enjoyed the enormous advantage derived from the use
of the bow. Giraldus, whatever his defects, was a shrewd and sound
observer; and he tells us of the demoralizing effect on the natives, in
the early days of the conquest, of the arrows against which they had
no means of defence. Careful investigation shows that each band of the
invaders landed with a force of knights and archers, the latter being
usually found in the proportion of ten to one. In the combined action
of these two arms, as at the great battle which had decided the fate
of England, the Normans excelled. “In Hibernis conflictibus,” wrote
Gerald, “hoc summopere curandum, ut semper arcarii militibus turmis
mixtim adjiciantur.” As Harold had discovered, before the Conquest,
how unsuitable was a force composed of heavily-armed English infantry
for pursuit of the nimble Welsh, as Richard was shortly to find his
host of mailed knights and men-at-arms harassed to death by the swift
movements of the light Saracen cavalry, so, writes Gerald, the Irish
could only be successfully attacked by troops able to pursue them among
their mountain fastnesses. Nor are his criticisms less true for being
animated, as they evidently are, by the scorn of his gallant relatives,
as the pioneers of the conquest, for those later comers who despised
their experience, and on whom they looked in their fierce warfare, as a
rough colonist of the present day would look on a pipeclayed guardsman.
The very first battle in which the invaders took part proved that the
Irish could not hope to stand against them in the open. Forcing their
way with Dermot into Ossory, through the woods and bogs, they found
themselves deserted at a critical moment by almost all their native
allies, who lost heart suddenly and fled. Maurice de Prendergast,
one of their leaders, saw that the little English band was likely to
be “rushed” by the natives, with whom the woods were swarming (“Que
els lur curusent sure”). In accordance with the old Norman tactics,
he detached his archers to form an ambush, and then spurred for the
open field: the natives followed in hot pursuit, and their wily foes,
reaching ground on which cavalry could act, turned and rode them
down. The archers in their rear completed their discomfiture, like
the English sharpshooters at Poitiers, and the native “friendlies,”
with their beloved axes, were soon spread over the field, pleasantly
engaged in decapitating the corpses of their fellow-countrymen. I see
no reason to doubt the tale of king Dermot gloating over the heads that
his followers brought and piled before him, and leaping for joy as
with a loud voice he rendered thanks to his Creator on detecting among
them the face of a specially hated foe. It may have been the thought
of his own son, blinded by his kingly rival, that made him, we read,
clutch the head and gnaw the features with his teeth. Such a ‘deviation
from humanity’ (to quote a famous phrase) will not seem incredible to
those who have seen his countrymen, centuries later in the history of
civilization, burn alive a woman as a witch,[352] deliberately mutilate
defenceless men, or dance in the very blood of the murdered Lord
Mountmorres.
In all this internecine conflict the only motive that can clearly
be traced is the passionate desire for vengeance. To glut that
desire Dermot was ready, not only to call in the alien against his
fellow-countrymen, but even to promise ‘Strongbow’ the succession to
Leinster and his followers landed possessions, which he could only do
at the cost of enraging his own kinsmen and subjects. Giraldus, indeed,
is at pains to justify the position of the English in Ireland, and to
claim that it was virtually brought about by consent rather than by
conquest. Here again we may best picture to ourselves the situation by
comparing the treaties or concessions wrung from barbarous potentates
by the adventurous Englishmen of to-day. Dermot had notoriously
promised what was not his to give, without the least consideration for
the rights or interest of his people. But just as, at the conquest
of England itself, Norman casuistry had enabled William to claim the
succession by gift of his kinsman, and to forfeit as traitors all those
who opposed that claim, and just as his followers, by Norman law,
though standing in the shoes of English thegns, assumed the position of
feudal lords, so, in Ireland, the new settlers looked at things from a
feudal standpoint, and so originated that conflict of irreconcilable
polities which has practically continued without intermission ever
since. In the end indeed, especially outside of Meath and Leinster,
they adapted themselves, as is well known, to the native system of
government, and became, in the eyes of the English, more or less Irish
chieftains. But at first the necessities of the case accentuated their
alien status. For on the one hand the weakness of the royal power, and
on the other the danger of their position, conspired to give their
settlement an intensely feudal character. Our poem, as we have said,
shows us the lords of Meath and Leinster, respectively, enfeoffing
their followers to hold of them by knight service, and these became, it
should be noticed, the “barons” of Meath or of Leinster, a term which
in England was only found in the border palatinates of Chester and of
Durham. These barons were encouraged to construct castles at once as
the best defence against those sudden raids in which the Irish were
wont to indulge. In accordance with the policy of the Romans in their
day, and with our own at the present time, when extending the borders
of the Empire, the shrewd Gerald strongly urged that the country
should be opened up by constructing roads through its wilds, and then
held by fortified posts, or, as he expressed it, by castles. Writing
within twenty years of earl Richard’s landing, he had already to lament
that the Irish had learnt from their foes the use of the bow, and
had so greatly improved their tactics that the easy victories of the
early invaders were no longer possible: by castles alone could their
successors hope to hold the land.
In the conquest of Ulster we have, perhaps, the most striking exploit
of the whole invasion. Accomplished by individual, and indeed
unauthorized, enterprise, it was not complicated, as in the south, by
native co-operation or royal interference, but was carried through by
the reckless daring of a single adventurer and his band. With two
and twenty knights and some three hundred followers, John de Courci
set forth from Dublin, about the close of January, 1177, to conquer
the kingdom of Ulster. Eager for plunder and the joys of the foray,
there had flocked to his standard those adventurous spirits who chafed
beneath the strict rule of the governor, William Fitz Audelin. In the
depth of winter they hurried forth, and reaching Down by forced marches
on the fourth day from leaving Dublin, were enabled to seize it by a
_coup de main_. Masters thus of the capital of the land, they had also
secured a maritime base invaluable for their further operations. The
Irish, stunned by the suddenness of the blow, had fled, carrying their
king with them, and the adventurers were soon revelling in the plunder
they had sought. In vain the natives, rallying from their flight,
endeavoured to recapture their lost stronghold. Like the garrison
of Dublin when beset by Roderick O’Conor and his host, John and his
handful of followers sallied forth upon their foes. Giraldus shows us
their leader as he lived, towering in height above his fellows, a man
of war from his youth up, whose only fault was the martial ardour that
led him, when the battle raged, to forget the general in the soldier,
as he charged headlong on his foes. Mounted on his famous white war
horse, he now performed, as usual, Homeric deeds of valour, lopping
off the heads and limbs of his enemies with a sweep of his tremendous
sword. The Irish, though beaten at length, attacked him again in the
summer, only to experience again defeat at his hand. But so desperate
was the struggle for the land that in one of his battles he was left
with only eleven knights. With their horses slain, and without food,
the little band fought their way, for thirty miles, through their foes,
and made good their escape. By sheer hard fighting ‘Ulvestere’--now
Down and Antrim--was at length virtually subdued and then ‘castled’
by John. In time there rose on every side those strongholds of which
the crumbling ruins long bore witness to the harassed lives of the
alien lords of the land. Dreading the perils of the cloud-swept glens,
and creeping from rock to rock within sound of that troubled sea, the
“Barons of Ulster,” in their eyries, perched on the basalt crags,
wrought about the land a belt of conquest of which we have the noblest
relic in the wild glory of Dunluce. Their heirs still lingered on, four
centuries later, clinging “in great poverty and peril” to the lands
their ancestors had won. The Savages, the Jordans, the Russells could
still be recognised by their names, but we read of the “Fitzurses, now
degenerate, and called in Irish McMaghon, the Bear’s son.”[353]
Like the proud lords of Leinster and of Meath, John de Courci had
his feudal officers, his “constable” and “marshal,” his “seneschal”
and his “chamberlain.” Ulster, in fact, had duly become a typical
feudal principality. Essentially obnoxious as such a development must
have been in the eyes of the English Crown, its weakness in Ireland
compelled it to temporize, nor could it find any better way of checking
this growth of feudal power than by playing off, in Ulster, the Lacys
against De Courci, just as it played them off against the Fitzgeralds
in the south. Thus was initiated that policy of see-saw which, in
practice, has always been, and is still, pursued. A striking passage
on the subject in the quaint Book of Howth is not inapplicable at the
present time, when the prospect of that steady government which Ireland
so badly needs seems as distant as ever.[354]
By reason that the Irish heard this alteration and change of
governors, they did wholly swear never after to obey to the
English men, and said, ‘Seeing that themselves cannot agree, why
should we condescend to them ever after? For seeing that they
cannot love each one and other of themselves, they would never
love us that is strangers, and their mortal enemies. Therefore
let us take part together, and do that which please God we
shall; and first, here is in Connaught some of their knights,
and if we get the upper hand upon them we shall the easier win
the rest.’
‘Divide et impera’ was the policy adopted, and the spirit of faction
which the nobles seem to have imbibed from their Irish neighbours
was thus encouraged by the Crown. This system may be said to have
lasted down to the days of Elizabeth, to be succeeded, in the 17th
century, by the new rivalry of Catholic and Protestant, Cavalier
and Roundhead. But still the island was allowed to become the battle
ground of parties, favoured now, in turn,, by England, according to
the government in power at the time. But never, perhaps, has this
unfortunate system been more recklessly or disastrously pursued than
since Mr. Gladstone’s bid for the votes of the ‘Nationalist’ party.
Although Giraldus has been bitterly assailed for criticising with no
sparing hand the undoubted failings of the Irish, he showed, we think,
on the contrary, far more fairness than might reasonably be expected
from a writer in his position. But he did far more than this. It might
indeed be truly said of him ‘Rem acu tetigit’: he boldly gave the
reasons why the conquest of Ireland was a failure, and added frank
and shrewd advice as to its government in the future. Even as we have
been often told that Cromwell would have settled the Irish question,
had only his ‘thorough’ policy been relentlessly pursued, so Giraldus
justly reminds us that the first flood of conquest was checked by Henry
II., when the work was only half done, and that Henry himself, in like
manner, only put his hand to the plough to turn back at once and leave
the work to others. Those others, again, were commissioned only to be
recalled: the strong centralized administration that was shaping the
English realm was never organized in Ireland; the Crown harassed, but
it did not govern. The four prophets of Ireland, he wrote, had duly
foretold that the island would not be mastered by the English till the
eve of the day of judgment. If he accused the Irish of shiftiness and
treachery, as the failings that accompanied their natural quickness,
he sternly rebuked his own countrymen for despoiling their native
allies of their lands, and wantonly insulting the native chieftains
when they came to pay their respects to John as lord of Ireland. He
even charges them with being corrupted by their intercourse with the
natives into sometimes imitating their treachery. That this charge was
not without foundation we learn from the French poem, which gives a
spirited description of the action of Maurice de Prendergast--one of
its heroes--when he brought his ally the king of Ossory to the English
camp, having pledged his word for his safety. The king of Munster
urged that his rival should be treacherously seized, “E li baruns, san
mentir, le voleient tuz consentir.” But Maurice, indignantly denouncing
their contemplated breach of faith, swore by his sword that he would
cleave the head of the first man who should dare to lay a hand upon the
king.
It is chiefly, I think, because his evidence is fatal to the idle dream
of an Irish golden age that the evidence of Giraldus on the state of
the country has been so bitterly assailed. For my part, I believe his
statement as to the corruption in church matters to be entirely honest,
and deem them in accordance with what we know from other sources. In
his curious sketch of the lay ‘ecclesiastics,’ with their long flowing
hair, and with nothing clerical about them but the absence of weapons,
he touches one of the worst abuses from which the church suffered in
Ireland. The very see of Armagh itself had been held for at least two
centuries in hereditary succession by lay chieftains, and the practice
had spread widely to the degradation of the church. For half a century,
indeed, before the coming of the invaders, efforts had been made at
church reform; but the initiative had come from England and from Rome,
and little encouragement was given by the native rulers themselves. Nor
will those who are acquainted with Irish society in the past reject as
improbable the statement of Giraldus that the clergy, though greatly
distinguished by their chastity and fervent devotion to divine service,
were apt to spend their evenings in drinking somewhat deeply. But even
to this he is careful to add, there were found honourable exceptions.
The important fact to be remembered is that, if Ireland had once been a
centre of Christianity, a bright star in a heathen age, its church had
deteriorated, not advanced, amidst the ceaseless and murderous strife
of native rule.
To say that the Anglo-Norman settlement, with its conquest, or rather
half conquest, of the country, proved a blessing to Ireland, is a
proposition that no one, probably, would care to maintain. Why this
should have been so is one of those fascinating problems that must ever
arouse the speculation and stir the interest of the student. The far
earlier Scandinavian settlements in Normandy and in Eastern England
have little in common with the exploits of Strongbow’s daring band.
Sicily in every way affords a closer parallel. Nearer in time to the
events we have discussed, its conquest, also, was no less essentially
a private enterprise. What the sons of Tancred had accomplished in the
south, the children of Nesta well might hope to bring to pass in the
west. Indeed the adventurers of the 11th century had faced a task,
to all seeming, harder than that which confronted the adventurers of
the 12th. Some might hold that the Norman race was no longer in its
prime, that its great conquering and governing powers were already
impaired. That its enterprise was less ardent, that in England it was
settling down, is, no doubt, the case: from the turbulent regions of
Wales adventurers were still forthcoming, but the pioneers of Irish
conquest were not supported by that inflow from England which was
needed for so great an undertaking, and which, in earlier days, would
probably have hastened to their support. But this was only one among
the causes of the great Irish failure. Sicily, like England, fortunate
in its kings, was fortunate also in that position of isolation which
enabled its Norman conquerors to work out their own destiny. If only
Ireland had enjoyed the same geographical advantage, if it had been far
enough distant from England, its invaders might, in the same fashion,
have established a dynasty of their own, and have quickly accommodated
themselves, with the marvellous adaptability of their race, to those
native ways to which indeed many of them did, ultimately, so strangely
conform. It is now recognised that the kings of England did not, and
could not, become true English kings till the loss of their Norman
possessions drove them to find in England their true home and country.
Giraldus was right when he urged that his friends should have been let
alone, or the royal power, if brought into play, exercised in full
force. One can, indeed, imagine what might have been the fate of
England, if, half conquered by adventurous bands of Normans, she had
then been half governed, from abroad, by a Norman duke.
Deeper still, however, lay the root of the trouble. The Normans had
found England a kingdom ready made, its people accustomed to governance
and recognising the reign of law. Coming of a kindred stock, and
possessing kindred institutions, the English had only to receive the
addition of a feudal system for which their own development had already
made them ripe. In Ireland, on the contrary, the new comers found no
kindred system. Its tribal polity had placed between its people and
themselves a gulf impassable because dividing two wholly different
stages of civilization. With no common foundation on which to build,
they could only hope to become Irish by cutting themselves off from
their own people. If, on the other hand, they wished to substitute law
and order for native anarchy, there was no indigenous machinery for
the purpose such as the Norman kings had found and used in England:
they had no alternative but to introduce the system they had brought
with them, a system absolutely irreconcilable with all native ideas
of land tenure. Whether Ireland, if left to herself, would even yet
have emerged from the tribal stage of society becomes doubtful when we
contemplate the persistence of the _mores Hibernici_. A comparison
of the changes in our own people between the 12th century and the days
of Queen Victoria--or even of Queen Elizabeth--and those discernible
in the Irish people suggests relative stagnation. It clings to its
ways as the peasant clings to that patch of soil which he will not
leave, and on which he can exist only in squalor and in want.[355]
Of one thing at least we may be sure. No fonder dream has enthralled
a people’s imagination than that of an Irish golden age destroyed by
ruthless invaders. The first invaders who entered Ireland did so by the
invitation of one of her own sons; and they found it, as an Irishman
has said, “a vast human shambles.”
Let Erin remember the days of old,
Ere her faithless sons betrayed her.
We went to Ireland because her people were engaged in cutting one
another’s throats; we are there now because, if we left, they would all
be breaking one another’s heads. When an eminent patriot is good enough
to inform us of his desire, but for the presence of a British judge, to
wring a brother patriot’s neck, we are reminded that the sacred fire
still burns in Celtic breasts. _Ævum non animum mutant._[356]
The leaders of the Irish people have not so greatly changed since the
days when ‘King’ MacDonnchadh blinded ‘King’ Dermot’s son, and when
Dermot, in turn, relieved his feelings by gnawing off the nose of his
butchered foe. Claiming to govern a people when they cannot even govern
themselves, they clamour like the baboo of Bengal against that _pax
Britannica_, by the presence of which alone they are preserved from
mutual destruction. No doubt, as one of them frankly confessed, they
would rather be governed badly by themselves than well by any one else.
But England also has a voice in the matter; and she cannot allow the
creation of a Pandemonium at her doors.
VIII
The Pope and the Conquest of Ireland
One of the hottest historical controversies that this generation
has known has been waged around a certain document popularly but
erroneously styled “the Bull Laudabiliter.” Duly found in the Roman
Bullarium (1739) and in the Annals of Baronius, its authenticity had
remained unshaken by sundry spasmodic attacks, and, some thirty years
ago, it was virtually accepted as genuine by Roman Catholic and by
Protestant historians alike. But since its learned examination and
rejection by Dr. (since Cardinal) Moran in November, 1872,[357] the
tide of battle has surged around it, the racial and religious passions
it aroused imparting bitterness to the strife.
“It is a question with me,” Mr. Gladstone wrote, of Adrian’s alleged
donation, “whether as an abnormal and arbitrary proceeding, it did
not vitiate, at the fountain head, the relation between English and
Irish, and whether it has not been possibly the source of all the
perversions by which that relation has been marked.... In Ireland the
English fought with an unfair advantage in their hands; they had a kind
of pseudo-religious mission, a mission with religious sanctions but
temporal motives. I do not see how this could work well.”[358]
It may be as well to explain at the outset that, as befits an Irish
controversy, the famous “Bull” in dispute is not really a Bull at all,
and that of the two assertions for which it is so furiously assailed,
the one is not to be found in it, but comes from another source, while
the other rests upon documents which even an assailant of the Bull
admits to be “certainly authentic.” But amidst the smoke and dust of
battle, these elementary points seem to have been hopelessly obscured.
For the benefit of those who may not be acquainted with “the Bull
Laudabiliter,”[359] I may explain that the document in question is
inserted in the ‘Expugnatio Hibernica’ of Giraldus Cambrensis,[360]
published in or about 1188, and is asserted by him to be the document
brought from Rome by John of Salisbury in 1155. He also gives with it a
confirmation of it by Alexander III., obtained, he states, by Henry II.
after his visit to Ireland.
Apart altogether from these two documents are three letters from
Alexander III., which are, similarly, only known to us at second
hand, being transcribed in what is known as the Black Book of the
Exchequer.[361] Broadly speaking, for the moment only, the main
difference between these letters and “the Bull Laudabiliter” is that
while, in the latter, Pope Adrian commends the intention of king Henry
to go to Ireland and reform the gross scandals prevailing there, Pope
Alexander, in the three letters, commends the action of the king in
having gone there for that purpose.
Having thus given a general idea of the five documents to be
considered, I must now glance at the motives that have animated
the attack on the “Bull.” The first of these is the reluctance of
the Irish, as Roman Catholics, to believe that it was the Pope who
authorized an English king to reign over Ireland; the second is their
refusal to admit that the state of things in Ireland is truly described
in the “Bull.”
Taking these reasons for attack separately, the first, as I hinted at
the outset, is a curious misconception. I need only, to prove that it
is so, print side by side the words of two bitter assailants of the
Bull--Father Gasquet and Father Morris.
FATHER GASQUET. FATHER MORRIS.
By this instrument ... The document by which Pope
Adrian IV. gave the sovereignty Adrian is supposed to have made
of the island to our English over Ireland to Henry
king Henry II.... From time Plantagenet....
to time the ‘fact’ that an
English Pope made a donation of In this letter there is not one
Ireland to his own countrymen word which suggests the idea of
is used ... for the purpose temporal domination.[363]
of trying to undermine the
inborn and undying love and
devotion of the Irish people for
the sovereign Pontiffs....
(But) Dr. Moran, the learned
Bishop of Ossory, adduced many
powerful, if not conclusive,
reasons for rejecting the ‘Bull’
as spurious.[362]
The fact is that the unfortunate document, denounced for its sanction
of Henry’s enterprise, does little, if anything, more than the three
Black Book letters, which emphatically approve that enterprise, when
undertaken, and sanction its results. Yet these letters are accepted,
we shall see, while the Bull is denounced as “spurious.”
So, also, the general charges against the character and morals of the
Irish people at the time, implied by the words of the ‘Bull,’ are
actually eclipsed by those formulated in the Black Book letters. And
yet the authenticity of the ‘Bull’ is assailed on the ground of these
charges while that of the letters is either accepted or discreetly let
alone.
It may have been observed that, in my opinion, these letters have by no
means played that important part in the controversy to which they are
entitled. The reason, perhaps, may be found in the fact that while the
defenders of the documents in the ‘Expugnatio Hibernica’ are conscious
that these letters by no means help their case, the assailants would
rather ignore evidence which confirms those statements in the “Bull”
that have specially aroused their hostility and forced them to denounce
it as ‘spurious.’
Father Gasquet, for instance, only refers to these letters as affording
“some very powerful arguments against the genuineness of Pope Adrian’s
Bull,”[364] and is careful not to commit himself, personally, to their
authenticity.
The vigorous attack by Father Morris, in his “Adrian IV. and Henry
Plantagenet,”[365] on “the document by which Pope Adrian IV. is
supposed to have made over Ireland to Henry Plantagenet” is painfully
disappointing. For he tells us, at the outset, in his Introduction that
were it not for the argument which it is supposed to carry with
it against the character of the Irish Church in the twelfth
century, the document itself would not have much importance (p.
xxxii.).
It is, therefore, his avowed aim to redeem the character of that
church, and his attack on Adrian’s “Bull” is only undertaken to that
end. He wishes to destroy the “impression that the Church in Ireland
in the twelfth century was corrupt and disorganized”; he repels “the
accusation that Ireland, in the 12th century had lapsed into barbarism,
and had so far lost her place in the Christian commonwealth that the
Pope was in a way compelled to come to the rescue.”[366] To prove his
case he is bound, of course, to deal with and reject the three letters
of Alexander III. (1172), which contained so detailed and fearful an
indictment of the state of morals and religion in Ireland at the time.
What, then, is our astonishment when he abruptly observes:
Our inquiry comes down no farther than Pope Adrian. Subsequent
letters of Roman pontiffs on the subject of Ireland stand by
themselves (p. 141).
Is it possible that he felt himself estopped by the verdict of his
predecessor, Cardinal Moran, whose “judicial spirit” he commends,[367]
and who, while rejecting “Laudabiliter,” accepts as “certainly
authentic” these awkward letters. It seems to me equally uncandid in
Miss Norgate to avoid discussing the “Privilegium” of Alexander III.,
and in Father Morris to ignore his letters in the ‘Liber Niger’ which
affect so gravely his case, and indeed impugn his arguments.
In their blind animosity to the “Bull,” its Roman Catholic opponents
have been led into most astounding, and indeed contradictory,
assertions. Father Gasquet, for instance, prints side by side with
“Laudabiliter” the letter of Adrian to Louis VII., in order to prove
that their opening passages are “almost word for word the same.”[368]
Yet Father Morris, who appeals to this letter, and assures us that
“there is no question as to the authenticity of this document,”[369]
insists that the style of “Laudabiliter” is “in glaring contradiction
to all the authentic ‘Bulls’ of Adrian IV.”[370] It may be retorted
that the letter to Louis was not a “Bull.” But, then, no more was
‘Laudabiliter’: the two documents belong to precisely the same class.
Stranger still, in assailing what he terms “the spurious letter,” he
points out, as a flaw, that
in the supposed commission to Henry the judge comes, as it
were, with lance in rest, as if he were charging the Moslem,
without any reference to those “undiminished rights (_jura
illibata_) of each and every church,” in the defence of
which, as we have seen, Pope Adrian was ever inexorable.[371]
It will scarcely be believed that the “spurious letter” contains the
very words for the omission of which it is condemned (“jure nimirum
ecclesiarum illibato et integro permanente”), and that the test of
Father Morris thus recoils against himself. It is difficult to treat
seriously so careless, or so reckless, a controversialist.
* * * * *
Having now briefly explained on what documents the controversy turns,
I may mention that my own reason for joining in so fierce a dispute is
that I hope to be able to contribute towards its decision two facts
which, so far as I know, have as yet escaped notice.
Wishful to approach the subject from an independent standpoint, I
have not studied the German papers dealing with the subject, but have
contented myself with those of Cardinal Moran (1872), the Analecta
Juris Pontificii (1882), Father Gasquet (1883), Father Malone and
Father Morris (1892), with Miss Norgate’s _résumé_ of the case and
unhesitating defence of ‘Laudabiliter’ in the ‘English Historical
Review’ (1893).[372]
Miss Norgate, in her lengthy article,[373] defended the “Bull” with
some warmth, recapitulating and answering the arguments of its various
assailants. There are, however, involved two distinct questions, which,
to quote a phrase of her own, “have been somewhat mixed up”[374] by
her. For clearness’ sake, I give them thus:
(1) Did John of Salisbury obtain from Pope Adrian in 1155 a
document which “gave Ireland,” as he expressed it, “to
king Henry”?
(2) If so, was it the document set forth _verbatim_ by
Giraldus in his ‘Expugnatio Hibernica’?
I have read through, not once or twice, but time after time, with the
greatest care, Miss Norgate’s article defending the authenticity of the
“Bull,” and I cannot find that this distinction has even dawned upon
her mind. Yet, to adapt her closing words, “one who fully accepts the
first” of these propositions “may yet dare to say” of the other, _non
sequitur_.
To the first of the above questions I give no negative answer: I merely
quote the two passages on which the assertion rests:
Ad preces meas illustri regi (privilegium) quod idem rex
Anglorum Henrico secundo ab Adriano papa Alexandri
(Adrianus) concessit et dedit decessore antea perquisierat, per
Hiberniam jure hereditario Johannem Salesberiensem,
possidendam; sicut literæ ipsius postmodum episcopum Karnotensem,
testantur in hodiernum diem. Romam ad hoc destinatum. Per
Nam omnes insuæ, de jure quem etiam idem papa Anglorum
antiquo, ex donatione regi annulum aureum in
Constantini ... dicuntur ad investituræ signum præsentavit;
Romanam ecclesiam pertinere. qui statim, simul cum privilegio,
Annulum quoque per me transmisit in archivis Wintoniæ repositus
aureum, smaragdo optimo fuerat.[375]--GIRALDUS
decoratum, quo fieret CAMBRENSIS.
investitura juris in gerenda
Hibernia; idemque adhuc annulus
in curiali archivo publico
custodiri jussus est.--JOHN OF
SALISBURY.
As I only described, at the outset, the documents, I have not hitherto
touched on the passage in the ‘Metalogicus.’ But it should be observed
that just as Miss Norgate confuses two distinct questions, so Father
Gasquet attacks “Laudabiliter” for a statement found, not in that
document, but in this passage from the pen of John of Salisbury.[376]
It is with the second of the above two questions that I am immediately
concerned. Assuming for the present that a document was actually
granted by Adrian, what ground have we for believing that the text in
the ‘Expugnatio’ is authentic? Between the appearance of her ‘England
under the Angevin Kings’ and that of her article in the ‘Review,’ Miss
Norgate seems to have discovered from Pflugk-Harttung, that there was
no copy of it, as she had imagined, “in the Vatican archives.”[377] She
admitted, therefore, that “the letter actually rests upon the testimony
of Gerald of Wales and the writer of the last chapter of Metalogicus.”
But here we see that confusion of thought of which I have spoken above.
The authenticity of the letter given in the ‘Expugnatio’ rests on the
authority of Gerald, and on his alone.
Let us then enquire what credence we should give to those documents
he professes to quote _verbatim_. The two which naturally occur
to one for comparison with “Laudabiliter,” are the letter of Dermot
to “Strongbow” summoning him to Ireland,[378] and the “privilegium”
of Alexander III. confirming that of Adrian.[379] The former begins
with a normal address, and then--breaks at once into a quotation from
Ovid![380] This gives us a clear issue. Does Miss Norgate believe, or
does she not, that a warrior (and a savage) summoning a warrior, in the
days of Henry II., would parade his classical erudition by dragging in
tags from Ovid? And if she does not, how can she ask us to accept as
genuine a document because it is given by Giraldus. As to the other
test document, the “privilegium” of Alexander III., Miss Norgate is
curiously shy of touching it; I can only find an incidental allusion
to “the letter whereby Alexander III. is said to have confirmed the
favour granted by his predecessor to Henry,” and even this mention of
it is merely introduced to protest against arguments “which are only
appropriate to” that letter being used as fatal to the authenticity
of “Laudabiliter” also.[381] Indeed, by writing as she does of “the
silence of Alexander III.” as to Adrian’s letter,[382] she implies
that the document given by Giraldus as his is an absolute imposture;
and she uses, we shall find, in another place, an argument directly
fatal to the authenticity of its contents.[383] And yet Giraldus sets
forth these two “privilegia” together as jointly constituting the title
to Ireland derived by Henry from Rome. The two must stand or fall
together; if Gerald was capable of composing the one, he was certainly
capable of composing the other.
* * * * *
Having now shown that the fact of a document being found in the pages
of Giraldus Cambrensis is no proof of its authenticity, I turn to the
first of the two points that I hope to establish.
The publication, in Ireland, of “the Bull Laudabiliter” is thus dealt
with by Miss Norgate:
It is acknowledged on all hands that there is no sign of any
attempt on Henry’s part to publish the letter in Ireland ...
before 1175. In that year Gerald states that the letter was
read before a synod of bishops at Waterford (Opp. v. 315–6).
This statement, however, rests upon Gerald’s authority alone;
beyond this there is no direct evidence that the letter was ever
formally published in Ireland at all.[384]
In another passage she admits, I understand, that it does not appear
to have been published by Henry until 1175 at the earliest.[385]
Now it is true that this date is so generally accepted that Father
Gasquet in assailing, and Father Malone in defending, the authenticity
of the Bull, are both agreed upon this point. The former, indeed,
boldly writes: “It is a matter beyond dispute that no mention whatever
was made by Henry of this ‘grant’ of Ireland by the Pope till at
earliest A.D. 1175.”[386] Father Morris similarly adopts “1175” as
the date when “Henry is said to have exhibited it at a synod held
at Waterford.”[387] Yet, when we turn to the passage referred to by
Miss Norgate, we find that no year is named by Giraldus himself. Mr.
Dimock appended the marginal date “1174 or 1175,” and this was also the
date he adopted in his Introduction. It was doubtless from him that
Professor Tout adopted this date in his life of William Fitz Audelin:
Fitzaldhelm[388] was also sent in 1174 or 1175 ... to produce
the bull of Pope Adrian.... He soon left Ireland, for (_sic_)
he appears as a witness to the treaty of Falaise in October,
1174.[389]
If William was sent to Ireland, as alleged, in 1175, it is obvious
that he cannot have returned thence by October, 1174. It is clear, in
any case, that, on examination, the date accepted “on all hands,” as a
fixed point, is a guess. Let us then see if, from other sources, light
can be thrown on William’s mission. There is an entry on the Pipe Roll
of 1173, which reads thus:
In Passagio Willelmi filii Aldelini et sociorum suorum et
Hernesiorum suorum in Hyberniam xxvii sol. et vi den. per breve
Ricardi de Luci (p. 145).
Professor Tout oddly assigns it to an alleged despatch of William to
Ireland in 1171; for in that case it would duly have been entered on
the Pipe Roll of that year.[390] It must, in the absence of evidence
to the contrary, be held to refer to a mission of William between
Michaelmas, 1172, and Michaelmas, 1173. Is it then possible that this
was the date of the mission of which we are in search, and not 1175,
or even 1174? The answer, we shall find, involves more than a mere
question of chronology.
“Gerald,” Miss Norgate writes, “is certainly no chronologist.”[391] Mr.
Dimock was even more emphatic: “There can be no worse authority than
Giraldus wherever a date is concerned.”[392] In this case, however, as
I have said, Giraldus does not even commit himself to a date: he merely
uses the vague “interea.” We must therefore deduce the date from the
sequence as he gives it himself. And that sequence is perfectly clear.
He takes us straight back to the Council of Cashel,[393] and tells us
that the document despatched by William and his colleague to Ireland
had been sent by the Pope in reply to the report of the proceedings at
that Council. Here are his own words:
(COUNCIL OF CASHEL.)
Ubi, requisitis et auditis publice terræ illius et gentis tam
enormitatibus quam spurcitiis, et in scriptum etiam sub sigillo
legati Lismoriensis, qui ceteris ibidem dignitate tunc præerat,
ex industria redactis, etc. (v. 280).
(ALEXANDER’S ‘PRIVILEGIUM.’)
Cum, _prænotatis_ spurcitiarum literis in synodo
Cassiliensi per industriam quæsitis, directis ad curiam Romanam
nunciis, ab Alexandro tertio tunc præsidente privilegium
impetravit, etc. (v. 315).
Miss Norgate, both in her History and in her article, seems to have
overlooked this latter important passage, doubtless from its occurring
in another part of Gerald’s work. She has thus not only missed his
sequence, but has failed to adduce his direct testimony to the despatch
of documents to Rome after the Council of Cashel. Roger Hoveden is
the only chronicler she quotes as an authority for the statement that
“the bishops joined with Henry in sending to Rome a report of his
proceedings and their own.[394] Now the ‘Gesta Henrici’ is a better
authority to quote from here than Hoveden; and from it, therefore, I
take the following statements”:
(1) The Irish kings “seipsos ei et ejus dominio dederunt
et homines ejus devenerunt de omnibus tenementis suis, et
fidelitates ei juraverunt” (i. 25).
(2) The prelates “eum in regem et dominum susceperunt et
fidelitates eo juraverunt contra omnes homines. Et inde recepit
ab unoquoque Archiepiscopo et episcopo litteras suas in modum
cartæ, extra sigillum pendentes, et confirmantes ei et heredibus
suis regnum Hyberniæ, et testimonium perhibentes ipsos eum et
heredes suos sibi in reges et dominos constituisse imperpetuum”
(i. 26).
(3) “Cum autem hoc factum fuisset predictus rex Angliæ misit
nuncios suos ad Alexandrum summum pontificem cum litteris
archiepiscoporum et episcoporum Hyberniæ ad confirmandum sibi et
heredibus suis regnum Hyberniæ, sicque factum est. Nam summus
pontifex, auctoritate apostolica, confirmavit ei et heredibus
suis regnum illud, et eos imperpetuum reges constituit” (i. 28).
We have then the independent evidence of Gerald and of the ‘Gesta’--
(_A_) That Henry sent “nuncii” to Rome after going to
Ireland.
(_B_) That these “nuncii” took with them documentary
evidence, in the form, according to Gerald, of “letters” from
the Legate and prelates at Cashel, but according to the ‘Gesta’
of sealed recognitions, by the several Irish prelates of Henry
and his heirs as kings (of Ireland).
(_C_) That the Pope in reply, according to Gerald, sent a
“privilegium” empowering Henry to rule the Irish, and reform
their ecclesiastical condition,[395] but, according to the
‘Gesta,’ confirmed Henry in possession of the kingdom of
Ireland, and appointed him and his heirs kings thereof for ever.
Here we have sufficient discrepancy to mark the independence of the
writers, combined with a distinct agreement to the effect that Henry
sent “nuncii” to Rome, that they took something with them to support
the king’s petition, and that the Pope, in reply to it, sent something
back.
What was it?
Here we must turn to a third quarter, where the evidence is wholly
independent. This is the Black Book of the Exchequer in which are
entered the three letters from Pope Alexander, all of them dated
from Tusculum, 20th September, 1172. Miss Norgate, in her History,
referred to them as documents of undoubted authenticity;[396] but in
her article, though stoutly maintaining that their evidence was not
hostile to the genuineness of the “Bull,” she seems to have felt uneasy
on the subject, for she changes her tone, and writes that they “purport
to have been written by Pope Alexander III.,”[397] nay, even speaks of
them as Alexander’s letters, “if they indeed are his.”[398]
To these letters, which Cardinal Moran pronounced “certainly
authentic,” I now invite attention. The first, which is addressed
to Christian bishop of Lismore (the legate), the four archbishops
(by name), and their suffragans the bishops, speaks of the “vitiorum
enormitates” made known to the writer by their letters (“ex vestrarum
serie literarum,” “ex vestris literis”) and the “abominationis
spurcitiam.”[399] No more exact agreement could be found than this
document presents with the statement of Giraldus that the Legate’s
letters, on behalf of the assembled prelates, recited “tam enormitates
quam spurcitias” of the Irish. Again, the third letter, “to the kings
and princes of Ireland,” similarly charges the Irish with “enormitatem
et spurcitiam vitiorum”; and it confirms not only Giraldus but the
‘Gesta’ by its words: “in vestrum Regem et dominum suscepistis et
ei fidelitatem jurastis ... vos voluntate libera subdidistis ...
fidelitatem quam tanto Regi sub juramenti religione fecistis.” Their
“juramenti debitum et fidelitatem predicto Regi exhibitam” is spoken
of also in the letter to the prelates. Passing now to the second
letter, which is to Henry himself, it introduces a new element; for
while that to the prelates had referred to their letters and “aliorum
etiam veridica relatione,” a vague phrase which, in the letter to the
princes, reappears as “communi fama et certa relatione,” the Pope, in
writing to the king, gives as his sources of information, first, the
letters from the Legate and Prelates, and then the _viva voce_
statements of Ralf archdeacon of Llandaff.[400] Now we know from the
‘Gesta’ that this Ralf was sent by Henry to hold the Council of the
Irish Prelates at Cashel;[401] and we further know that the king had
sent him to Rome as an envoy in the Becket business some two years
before.[402] We have then, in this letter, confirmation of the fact
that Henry sent a mission, with the prelates’ letter, to Rome, while
the envoy it names is the very one whom he was specially likely to send.
So far, then, we find a most convincing agreement. Pope Alexander
relied mainly for information as to the state of Ireland and as to
the action of Henry on the written report of his Legate and the other
prelates of Ireland, and on the personal statements of the king’s envoy
who came with it. As to these points, there can really be no question.
But the best proof, to my mind, of the authenticity of these letters
is that neither Giraldus nor any of the chroniclers used them, and
that, so far at least as the ‘Gesta’ and Hoveden are concerned, they
must have been purposely kept back. For the points of discrepancy
are even more instructive than the points of agreement. It may have
been observed that the ‘Gesta’ speaks of the documentary evidence as
consisting of the prelates’ sealed letters appointing Henry and his
heirs kings of Ireland. Giraldus, on the contrary, makes it consist
of a report from the Council of Cashel on the State of Ireland. The
letters explicitly confirm the latter statement, and wholly ignore
the evidence described in the former. Moreover, the assertion in the
‘Gesta’ that the Pope made Henry and his heirs, in reply, kings of
Ireland for ever is at direct variance with the letters, which do
nothing of the kind. We must, then, it seems to me, conclude that the
‘Gesta’ and Roger Hoveden deliberately strove to represent the Pope as
doing what he did not do, and dared not, therefore, quote the letters,
knowing them to be not at all what was wanted.[403]
It seems to me a strong argument in favour of the letters to Henry
himself, and one which may have been overlooked, that Pope Alexander
pointedly speaks of Henry’s fresh expedition as undertaken, like a
crusade, by way of penance for his sins:
Rogamus itaque Regiam excellentiam, monemus et exhortamus
in Domino, atque in remissionem tibi peccatorum injungimus
quatinus, etc ... ut sicut pro tuorum venia peccatorum adversus
eam tantum laborem (ut credimus) assumpsisti, etc.
Even if the words do not imply that Henry himself had so represented
it, they afford an answer to those who urge that the Pope could not
have approved of such an enterprise by one who was himself at the time
under a grave cloud.
Broadly speaking, they express the Pope’s warm approval of Henry’s
expedition--as a missionary enterprise. It is as the champion of the
church, and especially of St. Peter and his rights, that they praise
him for what he has done. Specially significant is the fact that the
rights claimed by Rome, under the Donation of Constantine, over all
islands are not asserted (as by John of Salisbury) as justifying the
grant of Ireland to Henry, but as entitling the Papal see to claim
there rights for itself.[404]
Accepting, then, these letters as genuine, let me briefly recapitulate
how the case stands. Their contents agree, we have seen, independently,
in the most indisputable way, with the narrative of Giraldus. Moreover,
that narrative, when carefully examined, leads us to infer that the
Pope’s answer was despatched in reply to Henry’s mission; and with that
inference the date of these letters (20th Sept., 1172) agrees fairly
enough. Such a date as 1174 or 1175 would not agree with it at all.
Lastly, Giraldus tells us that the Pope’s confirmation was despatched
to Ireland with William Fitz Audelin; and, indeed, we should naturally
expect that Henry, when he had succeeded in getting it, would lose no
time in publishing the fact. Both the statement of Giraldus and that
expectation are confirmed by the Pipe Roll entry, which proves that
William Fitz Audelin did visit Ireland between Michaelmas, 1172, and
Michaelmas, 1173, which is just the time that he must have done so, if
he went there in charge of the Pope’s letter (or letters).
But now comes the hitch. If Giraldus had given us the text of the
letter which the Pope really sent, and which is entered in the Black
Book, it would have agreed with and confirmed his narrative in every
respect. Instead, however, of doing this, he gave a letter, which even
his champions do not venture to defend as authentic, a letter which
does not agree with his narrative--for it ignores the legate’s report
and the other information supplied--a letter which, for all we can find
in it, was written in complete ignorance, not only of Henry’s visit to
Ireland, but of every other fact in the case. In short, it is a mere
general confirmation of Adrian’s famous “Bull,” and might as well have
been issued before as after the king’s expedition. And so clumsily
is it introduced that Giraldus does not even make the king ask for
anything of the kind.
I have said that even his champions do not defend its authenticity.
Miss Norgate, who defends with equal fervour Giraldus and
“Laudabiliter,” admits that its critics are right in stating that the
Pope’s letters in the ‘Liber Niger’
make no mention of any papal grant, nor of the tribute of
Peter-pence, which “Laudabiliter” expressly states that Henry
had undertaken to establish in Ireland.[405]
But, she urges, it was most improbable that the Pope would refer to
Peter-pence in 1172:
It would have been much more surprising, because highly
derogatory to his tact, wisdom, and justice, if he had mentioned
it at that moment.... To expect that he should assail them with
an instant demand for money before they had time to settle
down in their new relations, would be to charge him with equal
recklessness and rapacity.[406]
I do not say that I agree with the argument: it could, I think,
scarcely be weaker. But the point is that Pope Alexander, in the letter
given by Giraldus, and asserted by him to have been sent in reply to
the letters from the Council of Cashel (1171–2), is represented as
confirming the “Bull of Adrian” “salva beato Petro ... de singulis
domibus annua unius denarii pensione.” That is to say that, if the
letter is genuine, he did exactly what Miss Norgate assures us he would
not have done. It follows then, from her own argument, that the letter
cannot be genuine.[407]
I must here again remind the reader of the cardinal point in my case,
namely, that Giraldus has been misunderstood as assigning to “1175” the
despatch of the Pope’s “privilegium,” whereas his narrative clearly
shows that he treats that “privilegium” as obtained by Henry in reply
to the report of the Council of Cashel (1171–2) and as the Papal
sanction of what he had done in Ireland. That the king was anxious to
obtain this sanction, and to publish it, when obtained, as soon as
possible, we may readily believe. But that he obtained it as soon as
possible, and, having done so, made no use of it till he suddenly,
in “1175,” despatched it to Ireland _à propos de bottes_, is an
unintelligible hypothesis. In any case, we are confronted with the fact
that both the “privilegium”[408] and the Black Book letter purport to
have been despatched from Rome in reply to Henry’s mission. But they
could not both be the Pope’s reply: one or the other must be false.
This being so, we need not hesitate to decide in favour of the Black
Book letter; for the “privilegium” given by Giraldus is virtually
abandoned, we have seen, even by Miss Norgate.
The conclusion, then, at which we arrive is that Giraldus substituted
for the true reply of the Pope a false one merely confirming the “Bull”
Laudabiliter. From this conclusion we advance to the question whether,
if he was capable of concocting (or giving it currency when concocted)
a spurious letter of Alexander, he was not also capable of concocting
(or giving it currency when concocted) that letter of Adrian, which he
published with it, in the ‘Expugnatio,’ and which, in fairness, must be
treated as inseparable from it.[409]
We saw clearly at the outset that he can have had no scruple as to
inserting in his narrative--I will not say a forged document, but
one of which the text was the work of his own pen. On this point,
therefore, we need not hesitate. We may proceed then to enquire whether
Henry II. was likely to keep silence as to Adrian’s “Bull” when he
entered Ireland--the very time when he might be expected to make use of
it--and then produce it at a subsequent time with no particular reason.
Two propositions are here involved. As to the first Father Gasquet has
observed:
It was of vital importance when he went over to receive the
homage of the Irish, and could never have been withheld or
concealed at the Council of Cashel in 1172, at which the Papal
legate presided.[410]
Father Burke, whom he quotes, has bluntly insisted on the fact; and
Father Morris has similarly dwelt on the king’s suspicious silence.
So great, indeed, is the difficulty of supposing that Henry made no
mention of the “Bull” at the very time when, if ever, he was likely to
make use of it, that Miss Norgate wrote as follows, in her ‘England
under the Angevin Kings’ (ii. 115):
We hear not a word of Pope Adrian’s bull, but we can hardly
doubt that its existence and its contents were in some way or
other certified to the Irish prelates before ... they met in
council at Cashel in the first weeks of 1172.
Going even further, in another passage (ii. 81), she boldly spoke of
Henry’s “conquest won with Adrian’s bull in his hand.” And yet, when
afterwards, in her article, she wished to deny the difficulty, she
could turn round and confidently urge that “Henry said nothing about
the Pope’s letter, because it was a matter of no practical consequence
whatever.”[411] Such a _volte-face_ as this does not tend to inspire
confidence in her arguments. But even if we accept this, her later
conclusion, it only increases the difficulty of explaining why Henry
II. formally made the “Bull” public a year or two later (and still
more, why he should have done so, as she holds he did, in “1175”). And
this difficulty, so far as I can find, she does not attempt to meet.
Everything then, it seems to me, points to the clear conclusion that
Giraldus substituted for the genuine letters from the Pope, in the
‘Liber Niger,’ a concocted confirmation of an equally concocted “Bull”
from his predecessor Adrian.
Having arrived at this conclusion, I propose to ask three questions:
(1) Why did Giraldus do this?
(2) How were his documents concocted?
(3) Was there a conspiracy, in which Giraldus
joined?
As to the Welshman’s motive, it has been urged by his critics that he
wished to gratify the king. Miss Norgate retorts:
At no period of his life is it likely that Gerald would have
had any personal interest in putting in circulation, for King
Henry’s benefit, a document which he knew or suspected to be
forged; least of all would he have cared to do it for the sake
of bolstering up Henry’s claims upon Ireland.[412]
But whatever may have been his personal feelings towards Henry II. his
eagerness to prove the right of the English Crown to Ireland is one of
the leading features of his ‘Expugnatio Hiberniæ.’ He sets forth more
than once the arguments on which he bases it, and he treats the Papal
action as the crowning argument of all:
Et quod solum sufficere posset ad perfectionis cumulum et
absolutæ consummationis augmentum, summorum pontificum, qui
insulas omnes sibi speciali quadam jure respiciunt, totiusque
christianitatis principum et primatum confirmans accessit
auctoritas (v. 320).
The reference, in this passage, to the Donation of Constantine, and
therefore to “Laudabiliter,” is clear.
I pass to my second question: ‘How were the documents concocted?’
The unfortunate theory was advanced by the ‘Analecta’ writer that
“Laudabiliter” was adapted from a genuine letter of Adrian written, in
1158, to Henry of England and Louis of France, forbidding them to enter
Ireland, as they proposed to do, in conjunction. It was urged that this
genuine letter had been altered into the ‘Bull’ Laudabiliter, and thus
made to bear the very reverse of its meaning. It was necessary, for
this solution, to hold that the genuine letter did not refer, as had
been supposed, to Spain (_H[ispania]_) but to Ireland (_H[ibernia]_).
Although this bold theory was adopted by Father Gasquet,[413] he seems
to have been conscious of its weakness; for he leaves it with the
words: “Whether this theory as to the origin of the Bull be correct
or not,” etc., etc. The words “pagani” in the genuine letter are of
themselves fatal to the theory, and Father Malone had no difficulty in
showing that it was preposterous.[414] It is true that, as Miss Norgate
admits,[415] “between the introductory sentences of the two letters
there is certainly a close verbal similarity,” but even if this letter,
relating to the Spanish crusade was placed under contribution by the
concocter of our document, I should none the less advance as my own
theory the view that Gerald employed, largely at any rate, the genuine
letters of Alexander III., entered in the ‘Liber Niger.’ In support of
this theory I might adduce certain suggestive parallels:
THE LETTER. THE “BULL.”
sicut ... comperimus, ... ad Significasti ... nobis ... te
subjugandum tuo Dominio gentem Hiberniæ insulam ad subdendum
illam et ad extirpandum tantæ illum populum legibus et vitiorum
abominationis spurcitiam ... plantaria exstirpanda velle,
tuum animum erexisti. intrare.
Christianæ religionis suscipiat crescat fidei Christianæ religio,
disciplinam ... ita etiam et quæ ad honorem Dei et salutem
de suæ salutis perfectu coronam pertinent animarum taliter
merearis suscipere sempiternam. ordinentur, ut a Deo sempiternum
mercedis cumulum consequi
merearis.
quia, sicut tuæ magnitudinis sane Hiberniam et omnes insulas
excellentia [? cognoscit], ... ad jus beati Petri et
Romana ecclesia aliud jus habet sacrosanctæ Romanæ ecclesiæ,
in Insula quam in terra magna quod tua etiam nobilitas
et continua, etc. recognoscit, non est dubium
pertinere.
The very fact that these coincidences are rather suggestive than
verbal, favours, I think, the theory of concoction. But I am chiefly
influenced by the fact that “Laudabiliter” does little more than
paraphrase and adapt the contents of Alexander’s letter. Even its
clause as to Peter’s pence might be based on Alexander’s insistence
that Henry was not only to guard “jura beati Petri,” but “si etiam ibi
non habet (jura)”--as was the case with Peter’s pence--to establish
them himself.
And now as to my third question: ‘Was there a conspiracy?’ I doubt
if sufficient attention has been paid to the remarkable words of the
‘Gesta Henrici,’ followed as they were by Hoveden.[416] That they were
introduced of set purpose is evident from their repetition.[417] It
should be observed that the story told in the ‘Metalogicus’ of Adrian
and in the ‘Gesta’ of Alexander is to the same effect:
METALOGICUS. GESTA HENRICI.
regi Anglorum Henrico secundo summus pontifex ... confirmavit
(Papa) concessit et dedit ei et heredibus suis regnum
Hiberniam jure hæreditario illud, et eos imperpetuum
possidendam. reges constituit.
Neither the letters in the ‘Liber Niger’ nor even the documents given
by Giraldus can justify these expressions. Yet this must have been what
we may term the view officially adopted. As the Black Book letters of
Alexander III. could not be made to support this view, its upholders
preferred to fall back on the alleged grant by Adrian, as the source of
Henry’s title, and to pretend that his successor Alexander had merely
confirmed it. “Laudabiliter” did not, it is true, go so far as was
required, but it carried back the title to Adrian’s action, and, so
far, supported the story.
* * * * *
The subsequent attitude of Rome towards the English story is a matter
of obvious interest, but, as yet, of much obscurity. Cardinal Moran
relied on the personal information of Theiner for the statement that
nowhere in the private archives, or among the private papers of
the Vatican, or in the ‘Regesta’ which Jaffé’s researches have
made so famous, or in the various indices of the Pontifical
letters, can a single trace be found of the supposed Bulls of
Adrian and Alexander.[418]
In the strict sense of the words, no doubt the above statement may
be absolutely true. But in the document below, from Theiner’s own
work,[419] we have, surely, in the words “de voluntatis sedis ipsius,”
a most distinct reference, at least, to Adrian’s alleged action. In the
preamble to a Papal dispensation of the 13th century, we find these
words:
Exposita siquidem nobis dilecti filii nobilis viri Galfridi de
Ianvilla patris tui, fili Symon, petitio continebat quod cum
terra Ybernie ac eius incole, ut tenentur, nec sedi eidem, nec
Regi Anglie obedirent, sed velut effrenes per campum licentie
ducerentur, clare memorie Henricus olim Rex Anglorum de
voluntate sedis ipsius armata manu terram predictam intravit, et
eam ac habitatores ipsius ad ejusdem sedis obedientiam suaque
(_sic_) pro posse reduxit, et tam idem Rex quam ejus successores
in regno prefato probos viros nationis alterius studuerunt
successu temporis in terra memorata Ybernie ad continuandam
inibi sedis ejusdem obedientiam collocare.
The words of this preamble should be most carefully studied; for
though, as I have said, it clearly refers to the action of Pope Adrian,
in its statement that Henry invaded Ireland “at the wish of the Papal
see,” yet the words “velut effrenes per campum licentie ducerentur”
must, surely, be derived from the “tanquam effrenis passim per abrupta
deviat viciorum” of Alexander’s letter to Henry entered in the ‘Liber
Niger.’ If so, they are evidence, even though they stand alone, that
the existence and contents of this letter were known in Ireland at the
time.
There is another and far later reference to ‘Laudabiliter’ in a Papal
document, which I have not seen mentioned, although the document is one
of great consequence for Irish history. When Innocent X. despatched
Rinuccini as Papal Nuncio to Ireland (1645) he gave him formal
instructions, in which was comprised a brief outline of past events. In
it we find this definite and most striking passage:
For a long period the true faith maintained itself, till the
country, invaded by the Danes, an idolatrous people, fell for
the most part into impious superstition. This state of darkness
lasted till the reigns of Adrian IV. and of Henry II., king of
England. Henry, desiring to strengthen his empire, and to secure
the provinces which he possessed beyond sea in France, wished to
subdue the island of Ireland; and, to compass this design, had
recourse to Adrian, who, himself an Englishman, with a liberal
hand granted all he coveted.
The zeal manifested by Henry to convert all Ireland to the faith
moved the soul of Adrian to invest him with the sovereignty of
that island. Three important conditions were annexed to the
gift. 1st. That the king should do all in his power to propagate
the Christian religion throughout Ireland. 2nd. That each of his
subjects should pay an annual tribute of one penny to the Holy
See, commonly called Peter’s pence. And 3rd. That civil liberty
should be guaranteed, and the privileges and immunities of the
Church be held inviolate.[420]
This clear testimony to the Pope’s belief, in 1645, that Adrian had, by
‘Laudabiliter,’ invested Henry II. with the sovereignty of Ireland can
hardly be agreeable reading to Father Gasquet and his friends.
IX
The Coronation of Richard I
The first coronation of an English king of which we possess a detailed
account is that of Richard I. (3rd Sept., 1189). It was carried out,
says Dr. Stubbs, “in such splendour and minute formality as to form a
precedent for all subsequent ceremonies of the sort.”[421] As a more
recent writer has observed:
The order of the procession and the details of the ceremonial
were arranged with unusual care and minuteness; it was the
most splendid and elaborate coronation-ceremony that had ever
been seen in England, and it served as a precedent for all
after-time.[422]
It is consequently of some interest to learn on what authority the
narrative of this coronation rests.
The original authority is that of the writer formerly described as
“Benedictus abbas,” but now virtually known to have been Richard ‘Fitz
Nigel,’[423] who was not only a contemporary writer, but, as the king’s
Treasurer, would probably have been an actual spectator of the ceremony
he describes. His account is repeated by Hoveden,[424] who was also a
contemporary, and possibly present, but “adds only matter of extremely
small importance.”[425] We then come to Matthew Paris, writing some two
generations later, who gives, says Dr. Stubbs--
a similar account of the coronation, more closely resembling
that of Benedict ... in the few and unimportant places where
the two differ. He indicates the common source of information,
the Rolls (ed. Wats, p. 154) or Consuetudines (Abbreviatio, Ed.
Madden, iii. 209) of the Exchequer.[426]
This view was accepted by Dr. Luard (1874), who says of the narrative
given by Matthew in his Chronica Majora (ii. 348–350):
This account is taken from Benedict. The original source (the
Consuetudines Scaccarii) is referred to in the Hist. Angl., ii.
p. 8, and the Abbreviatio Chronicorum, iii. 209. See Madden’s
note, iii. 209.[427]
We are thus referred to Sir Frederic Madden, who, as keeper of the MSS.
at the British Museum, possessed special knowledge, and who wrote thus
(1869):
The details of Richard’s coronation do not appear either in
the Red or Black Books of the Exchequer, but they are given by
Benedict Abbas, pp. 557–560, and copied by Hoveden, from whom
Wendover somewhat abridges them, and thence repeated in the
greater Chronicle of Matt. Paris, ed. Wats, p. 153, and Hist.
Ang., ii. 6.[428]
This, it will be seen, hardly commits the writer to the view that some
Exchequer record was, as alleged above, the original authority. But
such, no doubt, might be the inference from this comment on the text.
As important inferences have now been drawn from this error, as I
venture to deem it, we must glance at the actual passage on which the
theory is based.
Unconnected with the narrative of the coronation, which is complete
without it, there is found, in the ‘Historia Anglorum’ (ii. 9) this
marginal note:
Officia prelatorum et magnatum quæ ab antiquo jure et
consuetudine in regum coronationibus sibi vindicant et facere
debent, in rotulis Scaccarii poterunt reperiri.
This obviously refers, not to the narrative in the text, which is that
of the coronation ceremony alone, but to the services performed “by
ancient right and custom” in the king’s house on that occasion. Of
these there is no description in the text. In another work ascribed,
but doubtfully, to Matthew Paris, the so-called “Abbreviatio,” the
coronation is mentioned, but not described; and there is added a
similar note;
Et quia exigit plenitudo historiæ officia quorundam magnatum
qui in coronationibus habent implere, de antiqua consuetudine,
lectorem hujus libelli abbreviati ad historiam transmitto
prolixiorem quæ in consuetudinibus Scaccarii poterit
reperiri.[429]
In both cases, it will be observed, an exchequer record is referred
to solely for the customary offices or services rendered by
certain magnates; and in both cases the present tense and the word
“coronation_ibus_” imply that the reference is general, and is not
merely a description of what happened at Richard’s coronation. Now my
contention is that the record referred to is that of Queen Eleanor’s
coronation in 1236, which is preserved, at the present day, in the
Red Book of the Exchequer, and which was known to Matthew Paris,
who appends to his narrative of the services at that coronation the
marginal note: “Hæc omnia in consuetudinario Scaccarii melius et
plenius reperiuntur.”[430] We actually find in that record the words:
“de prædictis autem officiis nullus sibi jus vendicavit,” etc.,[431]
which at once remind us of the marginal note found in the ‘Historia
Anglorum.’
* * * * *
The solution, therefore, which I propound is that the narrative of the
coronation, which is admittedly derived from the ‘Gesta,’ was written
by its author from his own knowledge, and certainly not derived by him
from an Exchequer record. In the first place, it is nowhere said that
he did so; in the second, it is little less than absurd to assume that
Richard would refer to a record in his own Exchequer for a ceremony
which must have taken place while he was writing his chronicle, and at
which he was probably present. The idea arose, as I have shown, from
a simple misunderstanding, and has led those who adopt it to direct
self-contradiction, for if Matthew derived, as admitted, his narrative
from the ‘Gesta,’ he could not also have derived it, as Dr. Luard
writes, from some Exchequer record.
As Richard had not described the coronation _services_, Matthew,
for these, refers us to that precedent preserved at the Exchequer
(Eleanor’s coronation), which was, we shall find, the recognised
precedent for coronation services so late as 1377.[432]
We may now pass to Mr. Hall’s theory that the non-appearance in the
Red Book of “the order of Richard I.’s Coronation, referred to (as he
holds) by Matthew Paris, is a third instance of palpable omission”[433]
of transcripts it formerly contained. His only reason for denying that
the above marginal notes refer (as I hold) to Eleanor’s coronation
(1236) is that “Hoveden, Bromton, and other authorities give an
abbreviated narrative” which implies the existence of such a record as
is supposed to have been lost. But Hoveden, as we have seen, copies
his narrative from the ‘Gesta,’ which he does not abbreviate, but
expands--and does not describe the “services,” which is what we want.
Mr. Hall’s meaning, however, is, as usual, obscure; for, having cited
the supposed narrative as at one time existing in our Red Book (p.
xviii.), he next tells us: “It can scarcely be doubted that Matthew
Paris’ reference was to some Exchequer Precedent Book which no longer
exists” (p. xix.), although, we read, it was certainly from our
existing Red Book that he took his “description of the pageant of 1236”
(pp. xix., xxxii.). He calls it the “custumal” (_consuetudinarium_) of
the Exchequer. And yet on page xxix. we read of Matthew referring to the
‘custumal’ of the Exchequer wherein a certain document of the
reign of Richard I. is said to have been entered, which no
longer exists in the Red Book or in any other Exchequer MS.
So also we learn, on page lxii., that Swereford compiled a lost work
“which was the custumal known to Matthew Paris, and the probable
exemplar of the Red Book of the Exchequer.” So Matthew’s ‘custumal’
(_consuetudinarium_) was not the Red Book itself, but its now lost
“exemplar.” Yet on page xix. we are told that this, the only ‘custumal’
mentioned by Matthew, was, beyond doubt, the Red Book of the Exchequer.
It is here, with Mr. Hall, the same as elsewhere. His work is marred,
throughout, by that confusion of thought which makes it almost
impossible to learn what he really means.
In any case my own position is clear. I assert that the note by Matthew
Paris refers, not to the narrative of the coronation, which he derived
from the ‘Gesta,’ but to a description of the “services”; and I hold
that he found this description, not in a lost Exchequer record, but in
the Red Book’s account of Queen Eleanor’s coronation.
X
The Struggle of John and Longchamp
(1191)
It is needless to insist on the critical character of the year 1191 in
England. From the moment when the watchers on the coast of Sicily had
seen the passing of Richard, this country found itself, for the first
time, cut off, for all purposes, from communication with its king. The
sovereign had gone, and his seal with him; and ministerial government,
a government by officials, was thrown on its own resources. If Henry
and his grandfather had taught their subjects faithfully to obey the
ministers of the Crown, with the king ever at their back, the case
was altered when the king had left them for a distant land. And men’s
thoughts turned to John, not only as the visible representative, in his
brother’s absence, of his house, but as not improbably their future
king, and that, it might be, before long. John, traitor at heart, saw
the strength of his position, and Longchamp was far too clever to
ignore the danger of his own.
To the tale of their inevitable strife for power, the acknowledged
master of that age’s history has devoted special care. In his edition
of the ‘Gesta Regis Ricardi’ (1867), and again in that of Hoveden
(1870), he has given the conclusions at which he arrived concerning
the order of events in 1191. We have, in the former, the footnote to
vol. ii., pp. 208–9, and in the latter, pp. lvi.-lxiv. of the preface
to vol. iii., and the “long note” on pp. 134–5 of the text. The last of
these is perhaps the one which sets forth most fully and clearly the
final conclusions of the bishop. These conclusions, I may add at once,
have been accepted without question by Mr. Howlett, in his ‘William of
Newburgh’ (1884)[434] and his ‘Richard of Devizes’ (1886),[435] by Miss
Norgate in her ‘England under the Angevin Kings’ (ii. 298–301) and her
Life of Longchamp,[436] and by Mr. Hunt in his Life of John.[437]
Summing up the narratives found in the ‘Gesta,’ Hoveden, Richard
of Devizes, and William of Newburgh, Dr. Stubbs holds that their
“divergency arises from the fact of the struggle falling into two
campaigns, in which certain details are repeated. There were three
conferences at Winchester, two attempts on the chancellor’s part to
seize the castle of Lincoln, and two settlements.” He then gives “the
harmonized dates, on this hypothesis, in detail.”
As to the first of these dates, the conference at Winchester on
Mid-Lent Sunday (March 24), recorded by Richard of Devizes, no question
arises. And I am in a position to adduce documentary evidence in its
confirmation; for Longchamp occurs as present at Winchester on March
28 in two separate documents.[438] It is when we come to the “two
campaigns,” one in the spring and the other in the summer, that the
difficulties begin. I propose, therefore, to append a sketch of the
sequence of events as recorded by William of Newburgh, the ‘Gesta,’ and
Richard of Devizes. Hoveden practically repeats the Gesta narrative,
and may therefore, for convenience, be omitted.
WILLIAM RICHARD GESTA.
OF NEWBURGH. OF DEVIZES.
The archbishop of The archbishop of
Rouen arrives (April Rouen arrives (April
27).[439] 27).
Longchamp refuses to Richard having left
recognise his Sicily for the East
authority. John plots (April 10), John
against Longchamp. hearing this begins
to plot against
Longchamp.
Matters are brought At length matters are
to a crisis by Gerard brought to a crisis by
de Camville being Gerard de Camville
summoned by Longchamp doing homage to John
to give up Lincoln for Lincoln Castle,
castle to him, and by which is declared to be
his refusing and treason.
joining John.
Longchamp sends Longchamps hastily Longchamp collects
abroad for collects troops, forces _after
mercenaries, but compels Roger Mortimer Midsummer_, and
hastens to besiege to surrender Wigmore, besieges Lincoln
Lincoln castle. and then besieges castle depriving
Lincoln castle. Gerard of his
shrievalty.
John surprises and John is enabbled to Nottingham and
seizes Nottingham and seize Nottingham and Tickhill are
Tickhill. Tickhill. surrendered to John.
Thereupon he orders He orders Longchamp He orders Longchamp
Longchamp to raise to raise the siege of to raise the siege
the siege of Lincoln. Lincoln. of Lincoln.
Longchamp knowing Longchamp is quite Longchamp,
many of those with taken aback, but terrified, withdraws
him were for John, recovering himself, with his army.
withdraws “confusus.” sends the archbishop of
Rouen to summon John to
A few days later he restore the castles he
“learns that his has taken.
office of legate had
expired by the Pope’s
death.”
Friends mediate. The archbishop arranges (Many bishops and
with John a conference other of the king’s
for July 28. lieges mediate.)
Longchamp consents, [440]
and withdraws.
Longchamp makes Description of agreement Brief summary
peace as best he between John and of agreement (which
could. Longchamp (wrongly Hovenden recites in
dated April 25). full).
Soon after, Longchamp
hears that his
mercenaries have
landed, and repudiates
the agreement. At
length, however, they
come to terms on a
fresh footing.
It is the contention of Dr. Stubbs that William of Newburgh, in the
first of these columns, describes the first, or spring “campaign,”
and that Richard and the ‘Gesta’ describe, in the other two, the
second “campaign” later in the year. The difficulty I always felt, in
accepting this conclusion, is the almost incredible coincidence of the
sequence of events here described occurring twice over, in exactly
the same order. But one would not be justified in questioning a view
confidently enunciated by Dr. Stubbs, and accepted, it would seem, by
every one else, on the ground merely of improbability, however extreme.
Let us see, therefore, on what evidence the accepted view is based.
In the first place, we are told that the above sequence was repeated
twice over. The authorities, however, are all agreed in mentioning one
such sequence, and one only.[441] Why, then, are we to convert it into
two, in the face of all probability? The only definite reason I can
find for so doing is that, according to William of Newburgh--
Longchamp’s proceedings against Lincoln took place early in the
spring, before the death of pope Clement III. was known, _or
the archbishop of Rouen landed_ [April 27];--[442]
while the ‘Gesta’ distinctly state that Longchamp only set out against
Lincoln “after Midsummer.” If this were so, the discrepancy would be
obvious. But leaving aside, for the moment, the question of the Pope’s
death, we find, on reference, that William of Newburgh, so far from
placing the campaign, etc., _before_ the archbishop’s arrival, actually
places it _after_ that event.[443] The one real discrepancy, therefore,
is found to have no existence.[444]
As to the date of Longchamp receiving the news of the Pope’s death,
it must first be observed that William of Newburgh does not assert
categorically that it reached him shortly after the fall of Lincoln.
What he says is that the chancellor “learned that his office of legate
had expired through the death of the pope.”[445] If this merely meant
that he heard of the Pope’s death, it would be irreconcilable with
William’s own statement that all this happened after, and some time
after, the archbishop’s arrival (April 27). Those, therefore, who would
take the words in this sense, must admit that William has blundered,
for he contradicts himself. This would be sufficient for my argument;
but I think we may hold, in fairness to William, that what Longchamp
heard, after withdrawing from Lincoln, was that Pope Cœlestine had not
renewed his legation, and, therefore, that it had expired with the
death of the late Pope.[446] Great mystery surrounds, it is admitted,
the date of the eventual renewal; and one point, it seems to me, may
have escaped notice. According to the envoys’ report in Hoveden, Pope
Cœlestine himself had been earnestly entreated by Richard to make
Longchamp legate. But Cœlestine was not elected Pope till four days
after Richard had left Sicily for the East. If, therefore, the renewal
was granted at Richard’s instance, there must have been considerable
delay before the grant was obtained.
Moreover, those who uphold the view at present accepted have to explain
a difficulty they hardly seem to have realized. The ‘Gesta’ assigns the
Pope’s death to April 10 (1191), but so uncertain is the date that we
find Dr. Stubbs writing:
Clement III. died about the Pope Clement dies April 10:
end of March, and the news of the news would reach England
his death would reach England in a fortnight or perhaps less.
about three weeks later The chancellor, trembling for his
(‘Gesta,’ p. 208 note). legation, makes a hasty peace
(Rog. Hov., iii. 135 note).
If Clement died April 10--the date adopted by Mr. Howlett and Miss
Norgate[447]--the difficulty is that the news must have reached not
merely England, but Lincoln (_ex hypothesi_) in time to allow of
preliminary negotiations between John and Longchamp, of a conference
at Winchester being agreed to, and of their both reaching Winchester
in time for that conference on April 25. For this the news must have
reached Lincoln hardly later than April 20. Could it possibly have done
so?
Those who have thus far followed my argument will have seen that I hold
there to have been only one “campaign,” followed by a conference at
Winchester, which “campaign” did not begin till after midsummer. The
spring campaign, with the alleged conference of April 25 at Winchester,
I hold to be wholly imaginary.
In case any one should still be in doubt, I now bring up my reserves.
The undisputed statement that Longchamp was at Winchester on March 24
was supported, we saw, by record evidence that he was there on March
28. Of more importance is the record evidence that he was at Lincoln
on July 8,[448] for it strongly confirms the statement in the Gesta
that he set out “after midsummer,” and, having rapidly reduced Wigmore,
laid siege to Lincoln Castle. Although I have been trying for years to
collect evidence of Longchamp’s movements in this eventful year, I have
not been able to secure many fixed points. It is certain, however, that
he was at Cambridge on April 21.[449] This affords welcome support to
the crowning discovery I made, in a document preserved in France, that
he was there on April 24.[450] It will, I presume, not be disputed that
if the chancellor was at Cambridge on April 24, he cannot have devoted
the following day to a conference with John at Winchester.
* * * * *
I have purposely refrained as yet from discussing a distinct question,
namely, the terms of the agreement, or agreements, between Longchamp
and John. For they do not affect the question of the sequence of
historical events. We have (_a_) in Hoveden what purports to be an
actual recital of the agreement made after the chancellor’s enforced
withdrawal from Lincoln; (_b_) in Richard of Devizes a _résumé_ of such
an agreement effected, according to him, at a conference on July 28,
also, it would seem, consequent on the chancellor’s retreat.[451] Dr.
Stubbs has argued as against Palgrave, and apparently with complete
success, that two distinct agreements are in question. But this does
not establish their date (or respective dates), nor even their right
sequence. I have already disposed of the alleged conference on April
25, and both agreements, therefore, must be later than the Lincoln
business in July. Now, it is singular that William of Newburgh
distinctly speaks of two agreements, and implies that the second was
the less unfavourable to the chancellor’s claims. This is, at first
sight, in striking harmony with Dr. Stubbs’ conclusion that the
agreement recited by Hoveden is the later of the two, and that in it
“the chancellor gave way somewhat more than was wise, but less than he
had done in April”[452] (_i.e._ in the agreement described by Richard
of Devizes). But a more minute examination than Dr. Stubbs could give
reveals a serious difficulty. According to him, the earlier agreement
“engages the chancellor to support John’s claim to the crown in
case of Richard’s death”;[453] while the later one contains no such
provision. On this distinction he lays stress because “the succession
of Arthur,” he holds, was a “main point” of Longchamp’s policy;[454]
while the archbishop of Rouen also, he urges, would have “sacrificed
other considerations to ... obtaining the omission of any terms which
would have openly asserted John’s claim to the succession.”[455]
But on turning to the ‘Gesta’ and to William of Newburgh, we find that
the former, in what is admittedly, and the latter in what he explicitly
makes, the later of the two agreements, declare the recognition of
John as heir, in case of Richard’s death, to have been the feature
of that later agreement, in which, according to Dr. Stubbs, it was
conspicuously omitted.[456] This grave discrepancy would seem to have
escaped notice.
I do not profess to determine absolutely the sequence of the two
agreements, but I think it not impossible that the one recited by
Hoveden may prove, after all, to have been the earlier of the two. They
have hardly, perhaps, been examined with sufficient care. Dr. Stubbs,
for instance, writes that in the agreement described by Richard “each
party chooses eleven commissioners,” while in Hoveden, “each chooses
seven.”[457] But the latter were merely sureties for the oaths of the
parties to observe the agreement,[458] not arbitrators for arranging
its terms; while, in the other agreement, the eleven were actual
arbitrators, chosen (as for the Provisions of Oxford) for drawing up
the agreement independently of the parties. Again, closer investigation
shows that the agreement described by Richard of Devizes is, in some
ways, more, not less, favourable to the chancellor than the other.
Hoveden, for instance, makes John surrender Tickhill and Nottingham,
not to the chancellor, but to the archbishop as representing the king.
Richard, on the other hand, makes the chancellor not only receive the
castles, but personally take hostages from their keepers for their
safe custody. In Hoveden, indeed, the possession of these two castles
is made, on the contrary, a kind of security for the chancellor’s good
behaviour. Richard, to speak more generally, brings the chancellor
to the front, and leaves the archbishop in the background, which is
precisely what might be expected when Longchamp felt himself strong
enough to pose once more as the king’s representative.
Moreover, we have a hint as to the order of these agreements in their
provisions as to Gerard de Camville. In Hoveden’s document we read that
he is to be provisionally restored, then to have a fair trial, and, if
convicted, is to lose his castle and his shrievalty.[459] Richard, on
the contrary, describes him as restored to the chancellor’s favour,
and, therefore, to the permanent custody of the castle.[460] The
latter, surely, is a later stage.
On all these grounds I lean strongly to the view that Richard of
Devizes describes the later and final compromise, which, unlike its
predecessor, was arranged by formal arbitration. On this hypothesis the
archbishop of Rouen had refused to give way about the succession,[461]
while the chancellor purchased concessions from John by throwing over
Arthur. But as I do not claim to have demonstrated this, I hope my view
will be discussed by some duly qualified critic.
On the other hand, the earlier part of this paper does, I hope,
demonstrate that the accepted view of the order of events in the year
1191 must be altogether abandoned. This, of course, involves the
correction of no fewer than four works in the Master of the Rolls’
series, and of every modern history of England which deals with the
period in any detail. Yet the chief interest of the enquiry will be
found in its bearing on historical probability and in its demonstration
of the value of minute critical study.[462]
XI
The Commune of London
When in 1893, the seventh centenary of the year in which a Mayor of
London first appears, I read before the Royal Archæological Institute
a paper on “The origin of the Mayoralty of London,”[463] I expressed
the hope that some document might yet be discovered which would throw
further light upon the Mayor and on his connection with the “Commune”
of 1191. Such a document I have since found. Its confirmation of the
fact that a “Commune” was actually established in London is as welcome
as it is important; but the essential fact which it enables us to
determine is that this foreign organization was transplanted bodily to
London. It has hitherto been supposed that the only change involved
by the erection of the “Commune” was the appearance of its typical
officer, the “Mayor,” as an addition to the pre-existent sheriffs and
the aldermen of the city wards. It can, however, now be shown that the
aldermen of the wards had no part in the “communal” organization, which
was modelled exclusively on foreign lines, and was wholly unconnected
with the old and English system.
The historian’s time can be profitably spent on minute and thorough
examination of London institutions in the 12th century. For the origin
and development in England of municipal liberties is still, in spite of
their paramount interest, involved in much obscurity. As Dr. Stubbs has
truly observed:
London claims the first place in any such investigation, as the
greatest municipality, as the model on which by their charters
of liberties the other large towns of the country were allowed
or charged to adjust their usages, and as the most active,
the most political, and the most ambitious. London has also a
pre-eminence in municipal history, owing to the strength of the
conflicting elements which so much affected her constitutional
progress.[464]
And yet, as he reminded his hearers in one of his Oxford lectures,
“Mediæval London still waits for its constitutional historian.”
Occupying as it did, among English towns, a position apart, in wealth
as in importance, London had a municipal development of her own, a
development of which our best historians can only tell us that it
is “obscure.” That obscurity, however, has been sadly increased by
the careless study and the misapprehension of her great charters of
liberties. Broadly speaking, and disregarding for the moment the
statements of our accepted authorities, the great want of London, in
her early days, was an efficient, homogeneous government of her own.
The City--for the City was then London--found itself in fact, during
the Norman period, in the same plight as greater London found itself
in our own days. “The ordinary system of the parish and the township,”
as an accomplished writer has observed, “the special franchises and
jurisdictions of the great individual landowners, of the churches, of
the gilds--all these were loosely bundled together.” For the cause
of this state of things we should have to go back to the origins of
our history, to show that the genius of the Anglo-Saxon system was
ill-adapted, or rather, wholly unsuitable, to urban life; that, while
of unconquerable persistence and strength in small, manageable rural
communities, it was bound to, and did, break down when applied to
large and growing towns, whose life lay not in agriculture, but in
trade. In a parish, a “Hundred,” the Englishman was at home; but in a
town, and still more in such a town as London, he found himself, for
administrative purposes, at his wits’ end.
Putting aside the “English Knightengild,”--the position of which as a
governing body has been far too rashly assumed,[465] and rests upon
no foundation,--the only institutions of which we can be sure are the
“folkesmote” and the weekly “husteng” of Henry I.’s charter, and the
Shrievalty. The “folkesmote” was the immemorial open-air gathering,
corresponding with the “shire-moot” or “hundred-moot” of the country,
the “borough-moot” or “portman-moot” of the town. The small “husteng,”
as is obvious from its name, was a Danish development, akin to the
“lawmen” of the Danish boroughs. If these represented, in London, a
kind of legal unity, the shrievalty, on the other hand, involved a kind
of financial unity. If, however, as I have urged in my study on the
early shrievalty,[466] the administrative development of London had
proceeded upon these lines, it would no more have brought about a true
municipal unity than the sheriff and the county court could evolve it
in the shire; a “Corporation” was wholly alien to administration on
county principles.
But in the meanwhile, the great movement in favour of municipal
liberties, which was so prominent a feature of the stirring 12th
century, was spreading like wildfire through France and Flanders, and
London, which, since the coming of the Normans, had become far more
cosmopolitan, was steadily imbibing from foreign traders the spirit
and enthusiasm of the age. But this by no means suited the views, at
the time, of the Crown, which, here as in Germany, looked askance on
this alarming and, too often, revolutionary movement. When the history
of London at this period comes to be properly studied, it will be
found that the growing power of the Londoners, who had practically
seated Stephen on the throne, and had chevied the Empress Matilda from
their midst, were sharply checked by her son Henry, whose policy, in
this respect at least, was faithfully followed by his successor,
Richard the First. The assumption, therefore, that the Mayoralty of
London dates from Richard’s accession (1189) is an absolute perversion
of history. There is record evidence which completely confirms the
memorable words of Richard of Devizes, who declares that on no terms
whatever would king Richard or his father have ever assented to the
establishment of the “Commune” in London.[467]
Writing mainly for experts, I need scarcely explain that the “sworn
Commune,” to give it its right name--for the oath sworn by its members
was its essential feature--was the association or ‘conspiracy’ as
we choose to regard it, formed by the inhabitants of a town that
desired to obtain its independence. And the head of this Association
or “Commune” was given, abroad, the title of “Maire.” It was at about
the same time that the “Commune” and its “Maire” were triumphantly
reaching Dijon in one direction and Bordeaux in another, that they
took a northern flight and descended upon London. Not for the first
time in her history the Crown’s difficulty was London’s opportunity.
Even so early as 1141, when the fortunes of the Crown hung in the
balance between rival claimants, we find the citizens forming an
effective “conjuratio,”[468] the very term applied to their “Commune,”
half a century later, by Richard of Devizes.[469] Moreover, earlier
in the same year (April), William of Malmesbury applies to their
government the term “communio,” in which the keen eye of the bishop
of Oxford detected “a description of municipal unity which suggests
that the communal idea was already in existence as a basis of civic
organization.”[470] But he failed, it would seem, to observe the
passage which follows and which speaks of “omnes barones, qui in eorum
communionem jamdudum recepti fuerant.” For in this allusion we discover
a distinctive practice of the “sworn commune,” from that of Le Mans
(1073),[471] to that of London, now to be dealt with.
When, in the crisis of October, 1191, the administration found itself
paralysed by the conflict between John, as the king’s brother, and
Longchamp, as the king’s representative, London, finding that she held
the scales, promptly named the “Commune” as the price of her support.
The chroniclers of the day enable us to picture to ourselves the scene,
as the excited citizens who had poured forth overnight, with lanterns
and torches, to welcome John to the capital, streamed together on the
morning of the eventful 8th October, at the well-known sound of the
great bell, swinging out from its campanile in St. Paul’s churchyard.
There they heard John take the oath to the “Commune,” like a French
king or lord; and then London for the first time had a municipality of
her own.
This much at least we may deem certain; but what the chroniclers tell
us has proved to be only enough to whet the appetite for more. Of the
character of the “Commune” so granted, of its ultimate fate, and of
the part it played in the municipal development of London, nothing
has been really known. The only fact of importance ascertained from
other sources has been the appearance of a Mayor of London at or
about the same time as the grant of a “Commune.” It cannot, indeed,
be proved that, as has sometimes been supposed, the two phenomena
were synchronistic; for no mention of the Mayor of London, after long
research, is known to me earlier than the spring of the year 1193.[472]
But there is, of course, the strongest presumption that the grant of
a “Commune” involved a Mayor, and already in 1194 we find a citizen
accused of boasting that “come what may, the Londoners shall have no
king but their Mayor.” It was precisely in the same spirit that the
‘Comuneros’ of Salamanca exclaimed of their leader in 1521: “Juras à
Dios no haber mas Rey ni Papa que Valloria.”
Before I explain my discoveries on the “Commune” granted to London,
it may be desirable to show how great a discrepancy of opinion has
hitherto prevailed on this important but admittedly obscure subject.
The first historian, so far as I know, to treat the subject in the
modern spirit was the present bishop of Oxford; and it is a striking
testimony to his almost infallible judgment that what he wrote on the
subject a quarter of a century ago is the explanation that, to this
day, has held the field. In his ‘Select Charters’ (1870), he expressed
the view that
the establishment of the ‘Communa’ of the citizens of London,
which is recorded by the historians to have been specially
confirmed by the Barons and Justiciar on the occasion of
Longchamp’s deposition from the Justiciarship is a matter of
some difficulty, as the word ‘Communa’ is not found in English
town charters, and no formal record of the act of confirmation
is now preserved. Interpreted, however, by foreign usage, and
by the later meaning of the word ‘communitas,’ it must be
understood to signify a corporate identity of the municipality,
which it may have claimed before, and which may even have been
occasionally recognised, but was now firmly established; a sort
of consolidation into a single organized body of the variety of
franchises, guilds, and other departments of local jurisdiction.
It was probably connected with and perhaps implied by the
nomination of a _Mayor_, who now appears for the first
time. It cannot, however, be defined with certainty (p. 257).
And in his ‘Constitutional History’ he holds that it practically “gave
completeness to a municipal constitution which had long been struggling
for recognition.” These comments, on the whole, suggest rather a
development of existing conditions than the introduction of a foreign
institution.
Mr. Coote, the next to approach the subject, contended that Dr. Stubbs’
“view falls very far short of the reality.” In his able paper “A
Lost Charter,”[473] he insisted that a charter was actually granted
in 1191 to the Londoners empowering them to elect a Mayor, and that
this is what the chroniclers meant when they spoke of the grant of
“Commune,” for the citizens, he urged, had possessed all the rights of
a “Commune” from the days of the Conqueror. With Mr. Loftie’s work came
the inevitable reaction. Wholly ignoring the definite and contemporary
statement as to the grant of a “Commune,” he deemed it “far safer
to adopt the received and old-fashioned opinion,” and to date the
Mayoralty from 1189, while, as for the “Commune,” he deemed it to have
been of gradual growth, and to have been practically recognised by the
charter of Henry I.
Now, whatever the grant of “Commune” implied, it certainly implied
something, and something of importance. “Upon this point there is,”
as Mr. Coote justly observed, “a cloud of contemporary evidence,
clear, exact and positive.” He put together the versions of the
chroniclers,[474] contemporary and well-informed, and their harmony is
complete. The fact, moreover, that the Commune was extorted at a great
crisis, proved that only when the government was weak could so great a
concession be wrung from it. Lastly, the phrase of Richard of Devizes:
“Concessa est ipsa die et instituta Communia Londinensium,” and that
of Giraldus: “Communa seu Communia eis concessa,” correspond exactly
with the formal phrases in the French charters of “Commune.” In the
case of Senlis (1173) it was “Communiam fieri concessimus”; in that of
Compiègne (1153): “Burgensibus villæ concessimus Communiam”; in that
of Abbeville (1185) “concessi eis Communiam habendam”; in that which
Queen Eleanor granted to Poitiers (1199): “Sciatis nos concessisse ...
universis hominibus de Pictavi et eorum heredibus communiam juratam
apud Pictavim.” But if any doubt were yet possible, it would be finally
removed by the words of Richard of Devizes:
Nunc primum, indulta sibi conjuratione, regno regem deesse
cognovit Londonia, quam nec rex ipse Ricardus nec prædecessor
et pater ejus Henricus pro mille millibus marcis argenti fieri
permississet.
There is no escaping from these words, and Mr. Loftie’s theory is,
consequently, out of court.[475]
But what of Mr. Coote’s? With great confidence he wrote that the
“Commune,” in the case of London, which had acquired all other things,
expressed for its citizens the mayoralty only; “nothing else was asked
or desired by them, for it was the sole privilege which was wanting
to their burghal independence” (p. 287). We find, however, that on
the Continent the word ‘Commune’ did not of necessity imply a Mayor,
for Beauvais and Compiègne, though constituted ‘Communes,’ appear to
have had no Mayor during most of the 12th century. The chroniclers,
therefore, had they only meant to speak of the privilege of electing
a Mayor, would not have all employed a word which did not connote it,
but would have said what they meant. Moreover, his theory rests on the
assumption, common till now to all historians, that the citizens had
continuously possessed, from the beginning of the 12th century, the
privileges granted in the charter of Henry I. But I have shown, in my
‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ that these privileges were not renewed by
Henry II. or Richard I., and that this fact strikingly confirms the
explicit words of Richard of Devizes, when he states that neither the
one nor the other would have allowed the Londoners to form a ‘Commune’
even for a million of marcs.
In ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville’ (pp. 357–9) I insisted on the necessity
of keeping steadily in view the annual _firma_ of London and
Middlesex, and showed that it was due in respect of the two jointly,
and not, as has been alleged of Middlesex, apart from London. The
further publication of the Pipe Rolls has enabled me to develop this
position. While the citizens, as I showed, strenuously claimed to hold
the city and county at ferm for £300, as in the charter of Henry I.,
the Crown no less persistently strove to exact a _firma_ of more
than £500. The exact amount of the high _firma_ is first recorded
at the change of shrievalty in 1169. The four outgoing sheriffs at
Easter of that year account for £250 “blank” and £11 “numero,” as the
half-year’s _firma_. This represents a total for the year of £500
“blank” and £22 “numero,” which is also precisely the sum accounted
for in 1173–4.[476] The whole sum would thus amount to £547 “numero,”
by the Exchequer system. But at Midsummer, 1174, there was a great
and a sudden change. Brichtmer de Haverhelle and Peter Fitz Walter
came into office not as sheriffs, but “ut custodes,” in the Exchequer
phrase,[477] and at Michaelmas they accounted not “de firma,” but “de
exitu firme.”[478]
The sheriff farmed his county and answered for a fixed _firma_,
as a tenant is responsible for his rent; the ‘custos,’ acting for the
Crown, like a bailiff for a landowner, was responsible only for the
actual proceeds (_exitus_). This distinction meets us even on the
earliest Pipe Roll (1130).[479] It is obvious that, on the _firma_
system, the sheriff might make a profit or a loss, according as the
sources of the ferm provided more or less than the rent for which he
had to account. But the point on which I am anxious to insist is that
the sources of his ferm were by no means so elastic as is alleged.[480]
As Professor Maitland observes:
The king’s rights are pecuniary rights; he is entitled to
collect numerous small sums. Instead of these he may be willing
to take a fixed sum every year, or, in other words, to let his
rights to farm.
He further describes these rights, in the case of a borough, as
“the profits of the market and of the borough court,” together with
“the king’s burgage rents.” Each of these sources, again, could be
sub-farmed.[481] This being so, I cannot agree with Dr. Stubbs in
holding that
the sheriff was answerable to the Crown for a certain sum, and
... nothing was easier than to exact the whole of the legal sum
from the rich burghers, and take for himself the profits of the
shire; or to demand such sums as he pleased of either, without
rendering any account.[482]
For the sources of the ferm were well defined: they were limited to
certain “rights.” The burgage rents were fixed; so, we believe, were
the tolls; and the fines arising from the courts cannot have varied
much. Outside these sources the sheriff had no right to “exact”
anything from the burghers.
Here we have the explanation of an otherwise singular phenomenon. The
Crown, which was receiving, as has been shown, £547 “numero” a year
from the sheriffs of London and Middlesex, obtained less than half
that amount when its own _custodes_ were in charge! The proceeds for
the first whole year were £238 5_s._ 7_d._ “numero,” and out of this,
moreover, it had to pay Peter Fitz Walter £20 for his services, and the
clerks and serjeants (_servientes_) employed under him £8 10_s._; thus
the net receipts were only some £200 “de exitu firme de Londonia et de
Middilsexa.”[483] I infer from this that the _ferm_ extorted for London
and Middlesex had been shamefully high,[484] and that this was the
cause of the sheriffs being often laden with debt when they went out of
office,[485] as they had to make good, out of their own pockets, the
difference between the proceeds of the dues and the ferm exacted by the
Crown. It is possible that this was indeed the reason of four sheriffs,
as in 1130, being so often appointed; the loss would thus be spread
over a wider area, and the chance of recovering the debt greater. The
system, on this hypothesis, was strangely analogous to that by which,
at the present day, appointment as sheriff of a county is equivalent
to exaction of a fine by the Crown. Combining, as I have elsewhere
suggested, the fact that in 1130 each of the four sheriffs gave £12
to the Crown to be quit of his office with the clause in the earliest
charter to Rouen that no citizen should be compelled to serve as
sheriff against his will, we may certainly conclude that such sheriffs
were the victims of Crown extortion. But obscurity must still surround
the manner of their appointment.
There remains the salient fact that the Crown undoubtedly suffered a
heavy annual loss by the substitution of _custodes_ for sheriffs
in 1174. As this is a fact new to historians, one is tempted to seek
an explanation. The Crown’s loss being the city’s gain, it is at least
worth consideration that the change virtually synchronized with the
king’s arrival in London at the crisis of the feudal revolt. He was
welcomed, Fantosme tells us, by the citizens, and reminded
Ke nul peiist le Lundreis traïtres apeler.
Ne fereient traïsun pur les membres colper.
In the previous year he had been assured that they were
La plus leale gent de tut vostre regné.
Ni ad nul en la vile ki seit de tel eë
Ki puisse porter armes, ne seit très bien armé.
This testimony is in harmony with the fact they gave the Crown that
year (1173) a _novum donum_ of 1,000 marcs, supplemented by 100
marcs apiece from three leading citizens. It is, therefore, perfectly
possible that, as Rouen obtained from Henry II. a charter increasing
its privileges, as a reward for its attitude in the rebellion, London
may have been similarly rewarded by what was in practice financial
relief.
But the change did not last. After two years of the _custodes_,
they went out of office at Midsummer, 1176, their returns, “de exitu
ejusdem civitatis,” even lower than before.[486] Their place was
taken by William Fitz Isabel, whose account for the three months’
_firma_ at Michaelmas shows that it, at once, leapt up to the huge
sum formerly exacted.[487]
Having traced in ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville’ the fortunes of the long
struggle between the citizens and the Crown over the amount of their
_firma_--fixed at £300 by Henry the First’s charter, but raised by
Henry II. to over £500--I was led to test the chroniclers’ statements
as to 1191 by turning to the Pipe Rolls to see if the citizens’
triumph enabled them to secure that reduction on which they insisted
throughout. In the Roll of 1 Richard I. we find the _firma_, as
under Henry II., to be between £520 and £530,[488] but in the Roll of
two years later (1191) we suddenly meet with this bold entry: “Cives
Londoniæ--Willelmus de Haverhull et Johannes Bucuinte pro eis--reddunt
compotum de ccc libris blancis pro hoc anno.” This sudden return to
the old figure was effected at the very time of the change which the
chroniclers describe. The fact is as striking as it is welcome where
all is so obscure. In the following year (4 Ric. I.) we find the
_firma_ again amounting to about £300; but the difficulty of
ascertaining its sum where this is not given is, unfortunately, so
great that until the Pipe Rolls of the reign are in print we cannot
speak positively as to the endurance of this amount. In the Pipe
Roll, however, of the ninth year (1197) we find the account headed
(as in 1191): “Cives Lund[oniæ]--Nicholas Duket et Robertus Blund
pro eis--reddunt compotum de ccc libris blancis de firma Lond[onie]
et Middelsexe,” and in that of the tenth year the sum is similarly
stated to be £300 “blanch.” It is clear, therefore, that at the close
of Richard’s reign the citizens had made good their claim to farm the
city and county for £300 a year, as they had recommenced to do in 1191.
The explanation of their gaining from Richard the confirmation of
that success is probably to be found in their payment of £1,000, thus
recorded on the roll of 1195 (7 Ric. I.):
Cives Lond[onie] M et D marcas de dono suo pro benevolentia
domini Regis, _et pro libertatibus suis conservandis_, et
de auxilio suo ad redemptionem domini Regis.
In that case the king would have dealt with the _firma_, as he is known
to have dealt with the sheriffwicks of Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, etc.,
and simply sold it to the citizens for a lump sum down. In this year
(7 Ric. I.), accordingly, it is again the “Cives Lond[onie],” who,
through their two representatives, account for the ferm.
It follows from this that when the citizens paid John £2,000 “pro
habendo confirmationem Regis de libertatibus suis,” they did not
obtain, as I had gathered from his charter, for the first time a
reduction of the _firma_ to £300, but a confirmation of the
reduction they had won at the crisis of 1191.
This, then, up to now has been the sum total of our knowledge: a
_commune_ was granted to London in October, 1191; the ferm of the city
was, simultaneously, reduced from over £500 to the old £300, as granted
by Henry I.; and the Mayor of London first meets us in the spring of
1193. Of the nature of the _commune_ we know nothing; of its very
existence after the autumn of 1191, we are in equal ignorance.
It is at this point that the document which follows comes to our help
with a flood of light, proving, as it does, that London, in 1193,
possessed a fully developed _commune_ of the continental pattern.
* * * * *
“_Sacramentum commune tempore regis Ricardi quando
detentus erat Alemaniam_ (_sic_).[489]
Quod fidem portabunt domino regi Ricardo de vita sua et
de membris et de terreno honore suo contra omnes homines
et feminas qui vivere possunt aut mori et quod pacem suam
servabunt et adjuvabunt servare, et quod communam tenebunt et
obedientes erunt maiori civitatis Lond[onie] et skivin[is][490]
ejusdem commune in fide regis et quod sequentur et tenebunt
considerationem maioris et skivinorum et aliorum proborum
hominum qui cum illis erunt salvo honore dei et sancte ecclesie
et fide domini regis Ricardi et salvis per omnia libertatibus
civitatis Lond[onie]. Et quod pro mercede nec pro parentela nec
pro aliqua re omittent quin jus in omnibus rebus [pro]sequentur
et teneant pro posse suo et scientia et quod ipsi communiter
in fide domini regis Ricardi sustinebunt bonum et malum et
ad vitam et ad mortem. Et si quis presumeret pacem domini
regis et regni perturbare ipsi consilio domine[491] et domini
Rothomagensis[492] et aliorum justiciarum domini regis juvabunt
fideles domini regis et illos qui pacem servare volunt pro posse
suo et pro scientia sua salvis semper in omnibus libertatibus
Lond[onie].”
Before discussing this document one may well compare it with the
Freeman’s oath at the present day, as taken by the latest honorary
freeman, Lord Kitchener of Khartoum (4th November, 1898):
“I solemnly declare that I will be good and true to our
Sovereign lady Queen Victoria, that I will be obedient to the
Mayor of this City, that I will maintain the franchises and
customs thereof, and will keep this City harmless in that which
in me is; that I will also keep the Queen’s peace in my own
person, that I will know no gatherings nor conspiracies made
against the Queen’s peace, but I will warn the Mayor thereof or
hinder it to my power; and that all these points and articles I
will well and truly keep according to the laws and customs of
this City to my power.”
The obligations of allegiance to the Sovereign, of obedience to the
Mayor, and of keeping the King’s peace against all attempts to disturb
it, remain, it will be seen, in force.
* * * * *
On the importance, in many aspects, of this unique document it is
hardly necessary to dwell. Its _formulæ_ deserve to be carefully
compared with the oaths of allegiance and of the peace; but here
one must restrict attention to its bearing on the _commune_ of
London. For the first time we learn that the government of the city
was then in the hands of a Mayor and _échevins_ (_skivini_).
Of these latter officers no one, hitherto, had even suspected the
existence. Dr. Gross, indeed, the chief specialist on English municipal
institutions, appears to consider these officers a purely continental
institution.[493] But in this document the Mayor and _échevins_ do
not exhaust the governing body. Of Aldermen, indeed, we hear nothing;
but we read of “alii probi homines” as associated with the Mayor and
_échevins_. For these we may turn to another document, fortunately
preserved in this volume, which shows us a body of “twenty-four”
connected with the government of London some twelve years later
(1205–6).
* * * * *
“_Sacramentum xxiiij^{or} factum anno regni regis
Johannis vij^{o}._
Quod legaliter intendent ad consulendum secundum suam
consuetudinem juri domini regis quod ad illos spectat in
civitate Lond[onie] salva libertate civitatis et quod de nullo
homine qui in placito sit ad civitatem spectante aliquod premium
ad suam conscientiam reciperent. Et si aliquis illorum donum
aut promissum dum in placitum fatiat illud nunquam recipient,
neque aliquis per ipsos vel pro ipsis. Et quod illi nullum
modum premii accipient, nec aliquis per ipsos vel pro ipsis,
pro injuria allevanda vel pro jure sternendo. Et concessum est
inter ipsos quod si aliquis inde attinctus vel convictus fuerit,
libertatem civitatis et eorum societatem amittet.”[494]
* * * * *
Of a body of twenty-_four_ councillors, nothing has hitherto been
known. To a body of twenty-_five_ there is this one reference:
Hoc anno fuerunt xxv electi de discretioribus civitatis, et
jurati pro consulendo civitatem una cum Maiore.[495]
The year is Mich. 1200–Mich. 1201; but the authority is not first-rate.
Standing alone as it does, the passage has been much discussed. The
latest exposition is that of Dr. Sharpe, Records Clerk to the City
Corporation:
Soon after John’s accession we find what appears to be the
first mention of a court of aldermen as a deliberative body.
In the year 1200, writes Thedmar (himself an alderman), “were
chosen five and twenty of the more discreet men of the city and
sworn to take counsel on behalf of the city, together with the
mayor.” Just as, in the constitution of the realm, the House of
Lords can claim a greater antiquity than the House of Commons,
so in the City--described by Lord Coke as _epitome totius
regni_--the establishment of a court of aldermen preceded
that of a common council.[496]
Mr. Loftie, however, had pointed out several years before that this
view was erroneous:
It has sometimes been assumed that this was the beginning of the
court of aldermen. As we have seen, however, the aldermen were
in existence long before, and the question is how far they were,
under ordinary circumstances, the councillors and assistants of
the mayor.[497]
To any one, indeed, who realizes what the Aldermen were it should be
obvious that the passage in question could not possibly apply to them.
In his larger work, Mr. Loftie held that these councillors eventually
became “identified with the aldermen,” but he brought out the very
important point that their number could not be that of the wards.
The twenty-five councillors who advised the Mayor in the reign
of King John had gradually become identified with the aldermen;
and this title, which at first was applied to the heads of trade
guilds and other functionaries, was henceforth confined to the
rulers of the wards.
[NOTE]. It has been suggested that the twenty-five
councillors came from the twenty-five wards, but a chronological
arrangement of the facts disposes of this idea. There were
not twenty-five wards then in existence--moreover, it would
be necessary to account for twenty-six, if the mayor is
reckoned.[498]
As, then, they were not representatives of the wards their character is
left obscure. But when we turn to the foreign evidence, the nature of
the twenty-four becomes manifest at once; and we find in it conclusive
proof that the Commune of London derived its origin from that of Rouen.
M. Giry’s able treatise on the “Établissements de Rouen” shows us the
“Vingt Quatre” forming the administrative body, annually elected, which
acted as the Mayor’s Council. And the oath they had to take on their
election, as described in the ‘Établissements,’ bears, it will be seen,
a marked resemblance to that of the “xxiiij^{or}” in London.
(II). De centum vero paribus eligentur viginti quatuor, assensu
centum parium, qui singulis annis removebuntur; quorum duodecim
eschevini vocabuntur, et alii duodecim consultores. Isti viginti
quatuor, in principio sui anni, jurabunt se servaturos jura
sancte ecclesie et fidelitatem domini regis atque justiciam quod
et ipse recte judicabunt secundum suam conscienciam, etc.
LIV. Iterum, major et eschevini et pares, in principio sui
eschevinatus, jurabunt eque judicare, nec pro inimicitia nec pro
amicitia injuste judicabunt. Iterum, jurabunt se nullos denarios
nec premia capturos, quod et eque judicabunt secundum suam
conscienciam.
LV. Si aliquis juratorum possit comperi accepisse premium pro
aliqua questione de qua aliquis trahatur in eschevinagio,
domus ejus ... prosternatur, nec amplius ille qui super hoc
deliraverit, nec ipse, nec heres ejus dominatum in communia
habebit.
The three salient features in common are (1) the oath to administer
justice fairly, (2) the special provisions against bribery, (3) the
expulsion of any member of the body convicted of receiving a bribe.
If we had only “the oath of the Commune,” we might have remained in
doubt as to the nature of the administrative body; but we can now
assert, on continental analogy, that its twenty-four members comprised
twelve “skevini” and an equal number of councillors. We can also assert
that it administered justice, even though this has been unsuspected,
and may, indeed, at first arouse question.
It will, naturally, now be asked: What became of these “twenty-four,”
who formed the Mayor’s council in the days of John? Mr. Loftie, we
have seen, held that they became “identified with the Aldermen”; my
own view is that, on the contrary, they were the germ of the Common
Council. The vital distinction to be kept in mind is that the Alderman
was essentially the officer in charge of a ward, while the Common
Council, as one body, represented the City as a whole. In questions
of this kind little reliance can be placed on late commentators; but
the _formulæ_ of oaths are usually ancient, and often enshrine
information on the duties of an office in the past. Now the oath of a
member of the Common Council contains significant clauses:
Sacramentum ... hominum ad Commune Consilium electorum est tale:
... bonum et fidele consilium dabis, secundum sensum et scire
tuum; et pro nullius favore manutenebis proficium singulare
contra proficium publicum vel commune dictæ civitatis; et
postquam veneris ad Commune Consilium, sine causa rationabili
vel Majoris licentia non recedes priusquam Major et socii sui
recesserint; et quod dictum fuerit in Communi Consilio celabis,
etc.[499]
It is not only that this is essentially the oath of one whose
function it is to be a councillor: the striking point is that it
contains three provisions in common with those which bound, at Rouen,
the “Vingtquatre.” The councillor was (1) not to be influenced by
private favour; (2) not to leave the Council without the Mayor’s
permission;[500] (3) to keep secret its proceedings.[501] I do not
say, of course, that there is verbal concordance; but when we turn to
the oath of the Alderman, we see at once how much less resemblance his
duties have to those of the “Twenty-four.”[502] It presents him as
primarily the head of a Ward, responsible for certain matters within
the compass of that Ward. He has to take part with the Mayor in assize,
pleas, and hustings;[503] but his functions as councillor obtain only a
brief mention in his oath (“et que boun et loial conseil durrez a ley
choses touchantz le comune profit en mesme la citee”).
If any doubt is felt on the subject, it should be removed by turning to
the case of Winchester. There, as in London, according to the ancient
custumal of the city, we find the Mayor closely associated with a
council of “Twenty-four,” which, in that case, continued to exist down
to 1835:
Il iert en la vile mere eleu par commun assentement des vint et
quatre jures et de la commune ... le quel mere soit remuable de
an en an ... Derechef en la cite deivent estre vint et quatre
jurez esluz des plus prudeshommes e des plus sages de la vile e
leaument eider e conseiller le avandit mere a franchise sauver
et sustener.[504]
It is clear, to me, that “the Twenty-Four” were no more elected by
the Wards (as is persistently believed) in London than at Winchester,
but by the city as a whole, though we must not define the Franchise.
The Winchester Aldermen, on the contrary, were distinctly district
officers, as in London, “whose functions related chiefly, but
not wholly, to the police and preservation of order, health, and
cleanliness within their several limits.”[505] Moreover, they retained
at Winchester, down to a late period, their distinct character and
existence. According to Dean Kitchin:
The aldermen, in later days the civic aristocracy, were
originally officers placed over each of the wards of the city,
and entrusted with the administration of it.... It was not till
early in the sixteenth century that they were interposed between
the mayor and the twenty-four men.[506]
The general powers for the whole town possessed by the Mayor and his
council were quite distinct from the local powers of each Alderman in
his district. For my part, I cannot resist the impression that, while
the sheriff, bailiff, or reeve represented the power of the Crown,
and the Alderman the old local officer, the council of twenty-four,
so closely associated with the Mayor, and not the representatives of
districts, were a later introduction, of different character, and
representing the commercial as against the territorial element. Whether
the Aldermen joined the council in later days or not, they were never,
I believe, originally or essentially, a part of that body.
The chief objection, probably, to connecting the “commune” of London
with the “Établissements de Rouen” will be found in the fact that the
latter refer to a system based on a body of a hundred _pares_, of which
body there does not seem to be any trace in England. At Winchester
the _pares_ were “the twenty-four.” It is obvious that, in this
respect, there is a marked discrepancy; but if the electoral body was
different, the executive, at any rate, was the same. And if, as must be
admitted, there was a foreign element introduced, it would be naturally
from Normandy that it came.[507]
Writing in 1893, before I had discovered the documents on which I
have dwelt above, I insisted on the _foreign_ origin of the London
“commune,” and pointed out that the close association between London
and Rouen at the time suggested that the office of Mayor was derived by
the former from the latter.[508] It may be permissible to repeat this
argument from presumption, although its form was adapted to a wider
circle than that of scholars.
The _beffroi_ of France, to which the _jurat_ looked as the symbol
and pledge of independence, is found here also in the bell-tower
of St. Paul’s, which is styled in documents either by that name
(_berefridum_), or by that of _campanile_, which brings before us at
once the storm-tost commonwealths of Italy. It was indeed from Italy
that the fire of freedom spread. With the rise of mediæval commerce it
was carried from the Alps to the Rhine, and quickly burst into flame
among the traders and craftsmen of Flanders. Passing into Picardy, it
crossed the Channel, according to a theory I have myself advanced,
to reappear in the liberties of the Cinque Ports, with their French
name, their French “serements” and their French _jurats_.[509] Foreign
merchants had brought it with them to the port of Exeter also, almost
as early as the Conquest, and we cannot doubt that London as well was
already infected with the movement, and eager to find in the foreign
“commune” the means of attaining that administrative autonomy and
political independence which that term virtually expressed.
Hostile though our kings might be to the communal movement here, they
favoured it for purposes of their own in their Norman dominions.
This is a factor in the problem that we cannot afford to overlook,
considering the peculiar relation in which Normandy stood to England.
As M. Langlois has observed:
Jamais en effet la France et l’Angleterre n’ont été, même de nos
jours, aussi intiment en contact ... Jusqu’à la fin du xii^{me}
siècle, les deux pays eurent à peu près les mêmes institutions
politiques, ils pratiquaient la même religion, on y parlait la
même langue. Des Français allaient fréquemment dans l’île comme
touristes, comme colons, comme marchands.
Was it not then from Normandy that London would derive her commune? And
if from Normandy, surely from Rouen. We are apt to forget the close
connections between the two capitals of our Anglo-Norman kings, London
on the Thames, and Rouen on the Seine. A student of the period has
written of these:
Citizens of Norman origin, to whom London, in no small measure,
owed the marked importance which it obtained under Henry I....
Merchants, traders, craftsmen of all sorts, came flocking
to seek their fortunes in their sovereign’s newly-acquired
dominions, not by forcible spoliation of the native people, but
by fair traffic and honest labour in their midst.... Norman
refinement, Norman taste, Norman fashions, especially in dress,
made their way rapidly among the English burghers.... The great
commercial centre to which the Norman merchants had long been
attracted as visitors, attracted them as settlers now that it
had become the capital of their own sovereign.[510]
* * * * *
It is known from the ‘Instituta Londoniæ’ that, so far back as the
days of Æthelred, the men of Rouen had traded to London, bringing in
their ships the wines of France, as well as that mysterious “craspice,”
which it is the fashion to render “sturgeon,” although there is
reason to believe that the term denoted the porpoise and even the
whale. The charter of Henry, duke of the Normans, to the citizens of
Rouen (1150–1), brings out a fact unknown to English historians, by
confirming to them their port at Dowgate, as they had held it from the
days of Edward the Confessor. And the same charter, by securing them
their right to visit all the markets in England, carries back that
privilege, I believe, to the days at least of Henry I.; for, although
the fact had escaped notice both in France and England, it could
neither have originated with Count Geoffrey nor with Duke Henry his son.
Nor does the interest of this Rouen charter stop here. Among the
sureties for the young Duke’s fidelity to his word we find Richer
de Laigle, the youthful friend of Becket, “a constant visitor,” as
Miss Norgate, writes, “and intimate friend of the little household in
Cheapside.” And does not the name of Becket remind us how “Thomas of
London, the burgher’s son,” afterwards “Archbishop, saint and martyr,”
had for his father a magnate of London, but one who was by birth a
citizen of Rouen? Therefore, the same writer is probably justified in
maintaining that “the influence of these Norman burghers was dominant
in the city.” They seem, she adds, “to have won their predominance by
fair means, fairly. They brought a great deal more than mere wealth;
they brought enterprise, vigour, refinement, culture, as well as
political progress.”[511]
Now it is my contention that political progress was represented with
them by the communal idea. Their interests, moreover, would be wholly
commercial, and, therefore, opposed to those of the native territorial
element. If we turn to Rouen, we find its Mayor occurring fifteen years
at least before the Mayor of London, and styled Mayor of the “Commune”
of Rouen--“Major de Communia.” For Rouen was a stronghold of the
“Commune.” It is of importance, therefore, for our purpose to ascertain
at what period the communal organization originated at Rouen. In spite
of the close attention, from the days of Chéruel downwards, that the
subject has attracted in France, the conclusions attained cannot be
deemed altogether satisfactory.
The monograph devoted by M. Giry to the “Établissements de Rouen,”[512]
represents the _fine fleur_ of French historical scholarship, and
its conclusions, therefore, deserve no ordinary consideration. But on
one point of the utmost importance, namely, the date at which these
“Établissements” were compiled, I venture to hold an independent view.
The initial difficulty is thus stated by the brilliant French scholar:
L’original n’existe plus, et l’on ne sait à quelle époque
précise il faut faire remonter leur adoption dans les villes de
Rouen et de la Rochelle qui les ont eus avant tous les autres
(p. 2).
The first allusion to the jurisdiction exercised by the Commune of
Rouen is found, says M. Giry, in the charter granted it by Henry II.
shortly after its gallant defence against the French king. He then
proceeds:
C’est du reste à la fin du règne de Henri II. que nous voyons
pour la première fois la ville de Rouen décorée du titre de
Commune (_communia_) dans un grand nombre de chartes dont les
listes de témoins circonscrivent la date entre 1173 et 1189.
Dans ces chartes les mentions d’un maire, de pairs, d’un
bailli, nous font voir qu’alors déjà la ville jouissait de
l’organisation municipale que les Établissements exposent avec
plus de détails; elles nous permettent de croire que cette
constitution, à peu près telle qu’elle nous est parvenue y était
alors en vigueur (p. 28).
A footnote is appended, giving “l’indication de quelques-unes des
chartes, malheureusement sans dates, sur lesquelles s’appuie cette
démonstration”:
[1] “Radulphus Henrici regis cancellarius (1173–1181) ...
Bartholomeus, major communie Rothomagensis” ... [2] “in
presentia Bartholomei Fergant qui tunc erat major communie
Rothomagensis (1177–1189) et parium ipsius civitatis,” etc.
The expert will perceive that these two charters “demonstrate,” not
a date “entre 1173 et 1189,” but between 1177 and 1181. For if
Bartholomew’s rule as mayor began in 1177, the first cannot be of
earlier date; and if Ralf ceased to be chancellor in 1181,[513] its
mention of a “commune” cannot be of later date than that year. As a
matter of fact, my own study of the Rouen cathedral charters (from
which this evidence is taken) has convinced me that Bartholomew was
mayor earlier than 1177; but I am, for the moment, only concerned with
M. Giry’s dates. Returning to the point later on, when discussing the
claim of priority for La Rochelle, he writes:
Les documents que nous avons pu interroger ne sauraient décider
même la question d’antériorité, puisqu’ils ne donnent que des
époques approximatives et circonscrivent la date, pour Rouen
entre 1177 et 1183, et pour la Rochelle entre 1169 et 1199 (pp.
67–8.)
No reference is given for the date “1183,” but it must be derived from
the “demonstration” on p. 29 (footnote), where a charter is mentioned
which speaks of the “Communio Rothomagi” in the time of archbishop
Hugh, “1129–1183.” But now comes the startling fact. It was not Hugh
who died in 1183, but his successor, Rotrou! Hugh himself had died so
early as 1164. Therefore, if this charter can be trusted, it proves
that the “communio” was in existence, and (as M. Giry holds), the
“Établissements” with it, at least as early as 1164. But the fact is
that, as M. Giry had himself observed, when speaking, just before, of
duke Henry’s charter, “la _communio Rothomagi_ (art. 7) ne désigne que
la communauté des citoyens” (p. 26); it does not prove the existence
of a _commune_, and, of course, still less of the “Établissements.”
But I would urge that not even the mention of a true _commune_
(“communia”) in a charter proves the adoption of the “Établissements”
at the time. For Henry’s grant of a “communia” to La Rochelle was
made, according to M. Giry, between 1169 and 1178;[514] and yet, as we
have seen, he does not deem the adoption of the “Établissements” at
La Rochelle proved before 1199. In that year Queen Eleanor granted to
Saintes “ut communiam suam teneant secundum formam et modum communie
de Rochella.” Even this, I venture to think, is not actual proof that
the “Établissements de Rouen” had already been adopted at La Rochelle,
though it certainly affords some presumption in favour of that view.
It is only when we turn from this external evidence to the text of
the “Établissements” themselves, that we discover, in two passages, a
direct clue. In these an exception is made in the words: “nisi dominus
rex vel filius ejus adsint Rothomagi vel assisia” (ii. 24, 28). On
these M. Giry writes:
Les articles qui prévoient la présence à Rouen du roi ou de son
fils ne peuvent guère s’appliquer qu’à Henri II. et à Richard
Cœur-de-Lion. C’est donc des dernières années du règne de Henri
II., après l’année 1169, qu’il faut dater la rédaction des
Établissements (i. 11).
Here, then, we have yet another limit--the last (twenty) years of Henry
II. No reference, however, is given for the date “1169” (unless it
applies to La Rochelle--and even then it is wrong).[515] But my point
is that between the years “1169” (or “1177”) and “1183” the king’s son
here mentioned was, obviously, not Richard, but Henry, styled king of
the English and duke of the Normans, from his coronation in 1170 to his
death in 1183. And, even after Henry’s death, Richard was never duke
of the Normans in his father’s lifetime. My own conclusion, therefore,
is that these parts, at least of the “Établissements,” and probably
the whole of them, were composed before the death of the young king in
1183, and probably after his coronation, and admission to a share of
his father’s power, in 1170. Thus they may well have been connected
with Henry’s charter to Rouen granted in 1174–1175.
These considerations may have led us somewhat far afield; but if I am
right in deriving from the Norman capital of our kings the 12th century
“Commune of London,” the origins of the Rouen “Commune” deserve our
careful study. The same MS. which yielded the leading document in this
paper contains two others, of which something must be said. But before
doing so we will glance at one of different origin, which, in more ways
than one, we may associate with the ‘Commune.’
The charter which follows is chiefly introduced for the interesting
phrase found in it: “the greater barons of the city.” So far as I know,
this phrase is unique; and apart from its importance for London itself,
it has a direct bearing on that famous constitutional problem: who were
the “barones majores”? In the present case, the phrase, surely, has no
specialized meaning. It is probably a coincidence, and nothing more,
that “majores” and “minores,” at St. Quentin, had a defined meaning. In
M. Giry’s treatise on its _commune_ we read as follows:
Notons ici que les citoyens ayant exercé les fonctions de
jurés et d’échevins formaient dans la ville une véritable
aristocratie: on les appelait les grands bourgeois, _majores
burgenses_, par opposition aux petits bourgeois, _minores
burgenses_, qui comprenaient tous les autres membres de la
commune (p. cxi.).
And again:
À Saint-Quentin, comme dans toutes les communes, le pouvoir
était aux mains des habitants riches qu’on appelait, ainsi qu’il
a été dit plus haut, les grands bourgeois (_majores burgenses_),
parce qu’ils avaient exercé les charges municipales, et pour
les distinguer des petits bourgeois (_minores burgenses_),
dénomination appliquée à tous ceux qui n’avaient point rempli
les fonctions de juré ou d’échevin. En 1318, pendent la
suspension de la commune, ces petits bourgeois se plaignirent de
la mauvaise répartition des tailles et traduisirent devant le
Parlement les grands bourgeois, auteurs des rôles d’imposition
incriminés (p. cxv.).
The original of this charter is preserved at the Public Record
Office.[516] It is assigned in the official calendar to 1189–1196,
but this date can be greatly narrowed. For while it is subsequent to
William’s consecration (31st Dec., 1189), it must be previous to his
obtaining the legation in June, 1190, for Bishop Hugh was his open foe
before he lost it, and could not act with him after that.
Willelmus dei gratia Elyensis episcopus Domini Regis
cancellarius universis Christi fidelibus ad quos presens
scriptum pervenerit salutem in vero salutari. Universitati
vestre notum fieri volumus nos dedisse et concessisse et
presenti carta nostra confirmasse dilecto et familiari nostro
Gaufrido Blundo civi Lond’ et heredibus suis totam terram
et mesuagium cum pertinentiis et libertatibus et liberis
consuetudinibus et rebus cunctis que ad predictam terram
pertinent, quam terram et quod mesuagium cum pertinentiis emimus
de Waltero Lorengo qui fuit nepos Petri filii Walteri[517] et
Roberti filii Walteri et eorum heres per veredictum tocius
civitatis Londoniarum (_sic_), et hoc testificatum fuit
coram nobis _a maioribus baronibus civitatis_ apud Turrim
Lond’. Que terra et quod mesuagium cum pertinentiis fuerunt
predicti Petri filii Walteri et predicti Roberti filii Walteri
qui fuerunt avunculi predicti Walteri Loreng’ et jacent in
parochia Sancti Laurentii de Judaismo et in parochia Sancte
Marie de Aldermanebery, habendum et tenendum predicto Gaufrido
et heredibus suis jure hereditario imperpetuum cum omnibus
pertinentiis et libertatibus et liberis consuetudinibus et cum
omnibus rebus, scilicet quicquid ibidem habuimus in terris,
in lignis, in lapidibus, in redditibus, et in rebus cunctis,
sine aliquo retenimento faciendo inde servicium quod inde
capitali domino debet, scilicet vj d. per annum ad Pasch’ pro
omni servitio. Hanc vero terram et mesuagium cum pertinentiis,
ut predictum est, ego Willelmus predictus et heredes nostri
predicto Gaufrido et heredibus suis contra omnes gentes
imperpetuum warrantizabimus. Pro hac donatione et concessione et
carte nostre confirmatione predictus Gaufridus Blund dedit nobis
quatuor viginti et decem libras argenti in gersumam. Et ut hec
nostra donatio et concessio rata et inconcussa predicto Gaufrido
et heredibus suis imperpetuum permaneat, eam presenti scripto et
sigilli nostri munimine corroboravimus.
Hiis testibus: Hugoni Cestrensi episcopo; Henrico de Longo
Campo fratre nostro; Willelmo de Brause; Henrico de Cornhell’;
Willelmo Puintel; Ricardo filio Reineri; Henrico filio Ailwin’;
Waltero de Hely senescallo nostro; Matheo de Alenzun camerario
nostro; magistro Michaele; Willelmo de Sancto Michaele; Gaufrido
Bucuinte; Simone de Aldermannebury; Baldewino capellano nostro;
Stephano Blundo; Philippo elemosinario nostro; magistro Willelmo
de Nanntes; Daniele de Longo Campo clerico nostro; Reimundo
clerico nostro, et multis aliis.
We have here a remarkable group of men--Longchamp himself, whose fall,
in 1191, was so closely connected with the birth of the _commune_, but
who is here seen, in the hour of his pride, speaking of “our brother,”
“our seneschal,” “our chamberlain,” “our chaplain,” “our almoner,”
and “our clerks”; Bishop Hugh, who was next year to take the lead in
expelling him from the Tower, as yet his stronghold; Henry of Cornhill
and Richard Fitz Reiner, who had ceased but a few months before to be
sheriffs of London, and who were to play so prominent a part at the
crisis of 1191; lastly, Henry Fitz Ailwin himself, who, as the ultimate
result of that crisis, was destined to become the first Mayor of the
_Commune_ of London.
The grantee himself also was a well-known citizen of London. In
conjunction with Henry Fitz Ailwin (as Mayor) and other City
magnates, he witnessed a gift of property in the City to St. Mary’s,
Clerkenwell;[518] and he seems to have been the Geoffrey Blund who had,
by his wife Ida de Humfraville, a son Thomas, who founded a chantry
in St. Paul’s for his uncle Richard de Humfraville, and his father
Geoffrey.
For the London topographer also this charter has an interest, as land
in St. Lawrence Jewry, and St. Mary Aldermanbury, must have closely
adjoined the site of the Guildhall itself. The sum named is a large one
for the time.
I now pass to the two documents of which mention has been made above.
The first of these[519] is of interest for its bearing on the “ward”
system. At Rouen the “excubia” was in charge of the mayor;[520] in
London, according to this document, he had not supplanted the sheriffs,
by whom it must have been controlled before his appearance. This I
attribute to its close connexion with the pre-existing system of
“wards,” each, I take it, a unit for purposes of defence and ward,
under its own alderman, with the sheriffs at the head of the whole
system.
DE EXCUBIIS IN NATALI ET PASCHA ET PENTECOST.[521]
Magna custodia debet invenire xii homines sed per libitum
vicecomitis abbreviata est usque ad viii homines.
Mediocris custodia debet viii vigiles, sed ita abbreviata usque
sex.
Minor custodia debet sex, sed ita abbreviata usque ad iiij^{or}.
Debent autem escavingores[522] eligi qui singulis diebus a
vigilia Nat[alis] domini usque ad diem epyphanie videant illos
qui debent de nocte vigilare quod sint homines defensibiles et
decenter ad hoc armati. Debent autem ad vesperam in die videri
et ad horam completorii exire et per totam noctem pacifice
vigilare et vicum salve custodire usque pulsetur ad matutinas
per capellas, quod vocatur _daibelle_. Et si aliqua defalta in
custodia contigerit, escavingores debent illos inbreviare et ad
primum hustingum vicecomitibus tradere. Potest eciam vicecomes,
si vult, cogere eos jurare de defalta quod nulli inde deferebunt
nec aliquem celabunt.
DE CARTIS CIVITATIS.
In thesauro due regis Willelmi primi et due de libertatibus
regis Ricardi et de eodem rege due carte de kidellis et de rege
Johanne due carte de vicecom[itatu], una de libertate et una
de kidellis cum sigillo de communi cons[523] (_sic_) habet i
cartam regis Johannis de libertate civitatis W. fil’ Ren’ habet
i regis Henrici de libertate et H[enricus] de Cornh[illa] aliam,
Rog[erus] maior habet cartam Regin[aldi?] de Cornh[illa] de
debito civitatis de ccc marcis.
The latter portion, it will be observed, describes the custody of the
city charters, and is of special value as fixing the date to that of
the mayoralty of Roger, who held the office in 1213.
The regulations for the watch are decisive, surely, of the functions
originally discharged by the “scavengers” of London. They were
inspectors of the watch. In his introduction to the ‘Liber Albus’(1859)
Mr. Riley held that--
The City Scavagers, it appears, were originally public officers,
whose duty it was to attend at the Hythes and Quays for the
purpose of taking custom upon the _Scavage_ (_i.e._ Showage)
or opening out of imported goods. At a later period, however,
it was also their duty, as already mentioned, to see that due
precautions were taken in the construction of houses against
fire; in addition to which it was their business to see that the
pavements were kept in repair.... These officers, no doubt, gave
name to the ‘_Scavengers_’ of the present day (p. xli.; cf. iii.
352, 357).
Professor Skeat adopts this view in his etymological Dictionary,
and develops it at some length, holding that “the _n_ before _g_ is
intrusive” as in some other cases, “and scavenger stands for scavager.”
He consequently connects the word with our “shew,” through “scavage.”
But no evidence whatever is adduced by Mr. Riley for his assertion that
the “Scavagers” originally performed the above duty or had anything to
do with it.
The last of these London records with which I have here to deal is the
so-called “Hidagium” of Middlesex.[524] The explanation of its thus
appearing among documents relating to the administration of London is
that when London and Middlesex were jointly “farmed” by the citizens,
the sheriffs answered jointly for the ‘Danegeld’ of Middlesex and
the corresponding _donum_ or _auxilium_ of London. Here therefore we
find these two levies side by side as on the Pipe Rolls. But though
the latter was levied from the city when Danegeld was levied from
the shire, it was in no way connected with hidation, but consisted
of arbitrary sums payable by the principal towns. Prof. Maitland,
therefore, is mistaken when, in his great work, ‘Domesday Book and
Beyond,’ he makes a solitary reference to our MS., as implying that
London “seems to have gelded for 1,200 hides” (p. 409). He has here
confused the assessed hidage of boroughs with the arbitrary _donum_ or
_auxilium_. This is shown by comparing the latter, as given by himself
(p. 175), with the ascertained hidage of towns and the payments its sum
would involve.
hides. [geld.] donum.
Worcester 15 £1 10 0 £15
Northampton 25 2 10 0 10
Dorset Boroughs 45 4 10 10 15
Huntingdon 50 5 0 0 8
Hertford 10 1 0 0 5
But the special interest of the entry, “c et xx libr.” (£120) lies in
the fact that this amount, which was the sum paid in 1130 and 1156, was
obsolete after that time, much larger sums being thenceforth exacted
from London. It is, of course, just possible that the obsolete figure
was retained, as a protest, on this list; but it is far more probable
that what we have here is a copy _temp._ John of an earlier
document, perhaps not later than the middle of the 12th century.[525]
HIDAGIUM COMITATUS TOCIUS MIDDLESEXE.
IN HUNDREDO DE OSULVESTUNE.
Villa de Stebehee l^{ta} hid.
Terra de Fafintune iiij hid.[526]
H[er]gotestune ij hid. Abb’is
Brambelee v hid.
Fulcham l^a hid.
Villa sancti Petri xvj hid. 2 dimid.
Hamstede v hid. iiij abb’s[527]
Lya x hid. abb’is
Tolendune ij hid.
Terra Gub’ti dim. hid.
Abbas Colcestr’ dim. hid.
Chelchede ij. hid abb’is
Kensintune x hid.
Lilletune v hid.
Tiburne v hid. Vs.
Willesdune xv hid.
Herlestune v hid.
Tuferd iiij xij d. hid.
Sum[ma] c et quater xx hid. et xi
hid. et dim.
IN HUNDRED’ DE YSTELWRKE c et v hid.
IN HUNDREDO DE SPELETHORN.
Stanes xxxv hid. Abb’
Stanwelle xv hid.
Bedefunte x hid.
alia Bedefunte x hid.
Feltham xv hid.
Kenetune v hid.
Suneb[er]ia vij hid. Abb.
Sep[er]tune viij hid. Abb.
Hanewrtha v hid. iij Abb’
Summa c et x hid.
IN HUNDREDO DE LA GARE.
Herghes c hid.
Kingesb[er]ia x hid.
Stanmere ix hid.
Terra com’ vj hid.
Alia Stanmere ix. hid. et dim.
Heneclune[528] xx hid. Abb.
Summa c et xl et ix hid.
IN DIMIDIO HUNDREDO DE MIMES lxx hid.
Toteham [5][529] hid.
Edelmetune [35][529] hid.
Mimes [35][529] hid.
Enefeld xxx hid.
Summa lx et ix hid.
Summa summarum octies c et liij hid. et dimid.
Summa Hidarum Abbatie Westm’. c et xviij hid.
DANEGELD.
Middelsexe quater xx libr’ et c sol. et vj d.
Londr’ c et xx libr.
SUMMA HUNDREDORUM.
Osuluestane cc et xj hid.
Spelthorn c et x hid.
Elethorn c et xxiiij hid.
Garehundr’ c et xlix hid. et dim.
Thistelwrkhundr’ c et v hid.
Explicit de comitatu de Middelsexe.
This list obviously requires to be edited by a local worker, who should
collate it with Domesday. In its present form it is clearly corrupt.
The amount of Danegeld due from the county implies an assessment of
850¼ hides (at two shillings on the hide), but the actual total is here
given as 853½. This again does not tally with the “summa hundredorum,”
which only records 809½,[530] while the detailed list of hundreds,
it seems, gives no more than 725½. It should be observed that the
hundred of “Mimms” is the Domesday hundred of Edmonton, while that of
‘Isleworth,’ similarly, is the Domesday hundred of Hounslow, which
contained Isleworth and Hampton.
XII
The Great Inquest of Service, 1212
It will be my object in this paper to recover and identify the
fragments of a great national inquest, which seems to have escaped
the notice of constitutional historians, and which, if its full
returns had been preserved, might not unworthily be compared with the
Domesday Inquest itself. In the course of doing so, I shall hope to
prove that abstracts of these returns have been wrongly assigned by
all antiquaries to an earlier and imaginary inquest, and that their
belief has recently received an official confirmation. The solution I
shall now propound will remove the admitted difficulties, to which the
existing belief on the MSS. has, we shall find, given rise.
The bewildering _congeries_ of returns known as the ‘Testa de
Nevill’--an Edwardian manuscript shovelled together, and printed by the
old Record Commission in 1807--has long been at once the hunting-ground
and the despair of the topographer and the student of genealogy. Now
that the returns contained in the Red Book of the Exchequer are also
at length in type,[531] it is possible to collate the two collections,
and thus to remove, in part at least, the obscurity that has hitherto
surrounded them.
Mr. Hall, in his preface to the ‘Red Book,’ writes thus:
The Sergeanties and Inquisitions which form a considerable part
of the Feodary in the Red Book of the Exchequer, have hitherto
been little known, and their true value has been by no means
sufficiently appreciated. This neglect has perhaps arisen from
the greater convenience of reference to the printed collection
known as the _Testa de Nevill_; but as it is now very
generally recognised that the text of this work is far from
satisfactory in its present form, the evidence of the kindred
returns contained in earlier Exchequer Registers deserves our
most careful attention (p. ccxxi.).
In the ‘Red Book’ itself the returns are headed:
Inquisitiones factæ tempore regis Johannis per totam Angliam
anno scilicet regni sui xii^o et xiii^o in quolibet comitatu de
servitiis militum et aliorum qui de eo tenent in capite secundum
rotulos liberatos thesaurario per manus vicecomitum Angliæ
tempore prædicto (p. 469).
They are accordingly given, by the editor, the marginal date
“1210–1212” throughout (pp. 469–574). On the other hand, the ‘Testa de
Nevill’ returns were, as he shows, delivered at the Exchequer on the
morrow of St. John the Baptist (25th June), 1212 (p. ccxxi.). Thus then
we have, according to him, two successive and “independent returns”:
(1) The ‘Liber Rubeus’ returns made between May, 1210, and May,
1212.
(2) The ‘Testa de Nevill’ returns made in June, 1212.[532]
It is necessary to keep these dates very clearly in mind, because,
although the editor accepts the ‘Red Book’ statement, and adopts
accordingly the marginal date “1210–1212,” he yet, by an
incomprehensible confusion, speaks of the same as the Inquisition
of “1210–1211” on p. ccxxviii. (_bis_), and even as “the earlier
Inquisition of 1210 entered in the Red Book” (p. ccxxvi.), and of “the
two independent returns of 1210 and 1212” with “two stormy years”
between them (p. ccxxiv.); while in another place he actually dates
the said “returns of 1210” as belonging to “1212” (p. clxv.). He thus
dates the Red Book Inquisitions in one place ‘1210–1212,’ in another
‘1210–1211,’ in a third ‘1210,’ and in a fourth ‘1212.’
Now I may explain at the outset that what I propose to do is to show
that instead of two Inquests (one recorded in the ‘Red Book’ and the
other in the ‘Testa’), there was only a single Inquest, with one series
of returns, and that this was the Inquest of June, 1212.
As this view is in direct conflict with the heading in the ‘Red Book’
itself, we must first glance at Mr. Hall’s statement that “the date of
the Inquisitions entered in the Red Book can be proved from internal
evidence” (p. ccxxiii.). What he there claims to prove is that their
date is between 1209 and “the early part of 1213.” Such a conclusion,
it will be perceived, in no way proves that they do not belong, as I
shall contend they do belong, to June, 1212. Putting aside the obvious
and inherent improbability of an Inquest being made in 1212 on the very
matter which had formed the subject of an Inquest only just concluded,
we need only compare the returns to prove their common origin. Mr. Hall
observes that at times
we come upon a passage of a few lines or a whole page or more
in the MSS., headed in the later Register ‘De Testa de Nevill,’
dated in the original rolls in the 14th year of John, and
corresponding entry for entry with the Red Book Inquest of the
12th and 13th years of that reign (p. ccxxv.).
But the obvious inference that the two Inquests were really one and
the same seems not to have occurred to him. We will glance, therefore,
at the parallel returns he has himself selected. Foremost among these
is “the Middlesex Inquisition” for 1212, of which he has printed
“the original return” as an appendix to his Preface (pp. ccxxvi.,
cclxxxii.-iv.), for comparison with the texts in the ‘Red Book’ and in
the ‘Testa de Nevill.’ But he warns us
that the numerous variants and the independent wording of the
entries, as well as the thirteenth century note “in Libro”
on the bottom of the Roll, forbid the supposition that this
is really an original of the earlier Inquisition of 1210
(_sic_) entered in the Red Book.
The “original” return and the two texts all begin with the “Honour”
of William de Windsor, who inherited from his Domesday ancestor,
Walter fitz Other, a compact block of four manors, East and West
Bedfont, Stanwell, and Hatton, in the south-west of the county. The
first entry is for East Bedfont, and the second ran, in the “original”
return: “_Walterius_ Bedestfont, Andreas Bucherel, feudum unius
militis.” But _Walterius_, Mr. Hall tells us, was altered in a
contemporary hand to “in alterius.” The ‘Testa’ renders this as “in
villa alterius,” while the ‘Red Book’ gives us “Walterius de Bedefonte,
Andreas Bukerellus j feodum.” There can be no question that the ‘Testa
de Nevill’ is right, and that Andrew Bucherel was the sole tenant of
the fee, for the scutage is accounted for accordingly on the same page
(p. 361). It follows, therefore, that the ‘Red Book’ and the “original”
return have both evolved, in error, a Walter de Bedfont from “in
alteri” Bedfont. Hence I conclude that the strip of parchment termed
by Mr. Hall “the original return,” was not the original return, and
that the error common to the ‘Red Book’ and itself demonstrates a close
connection between the two.
But if this document was not the original return, what was? To answer
this question, we must turn to Worcestershire, one of the counties
cited by Mr. Hall for the parallel character of the returns. How
significantly close is the parallel these entries will show:
Comes Albemarlie j militem et Comes Albemarlie tenet
dimidium in Severnestoke, pro Savernestokede dono regis Ricardi
qua et Kenemertone et Botintone per servicium j militis et
in Gloucestresyra Rex acquietat dimidii pro qua et pro Kenemerton
abbatem Westmonasterii de iij et Botinton in Glouc[estresyra]
militibus (‘Liber Rubeus,’ p. dominus Rex acquietat abbatem
567). Westmonasterii de iij militibus
(‘Testa de Nevill,’ p. 43).
It will be obvious, from the verbal concordances, that instead of
representing, as Mr. Hall holds, two “independent” returns made in
different years these texts are derived from one and the same return.
But instead of being, as in the case of Middlesex, arranged in the
same order, they are here found, in the respective texts, arranged
in very different order. The explanation of this is that the ‘Testa’
records the Inquest by Hundreds, while the ‘Red Book’ groups the fees
under the barons’ names and the sergeanties apart at the end. This is
particularly interesting from the parallel of Domesday Book, where
the Inquest, of which the original returns were drawn up hundred by
hundred, was rearranged in Domesday Book in similar fashion. I was led
to suspect that this great Inquest was, generally at least, drawn up by
Hundreds, from Mr. Hall’s remark that
There is a marginal note in the Red Book returns for Wilts,
now partially illegible, but (_sic_) which clearly records the
loss of the Inquisition of several of the Hundreds of that
county, while a precisely similar note is entered on the dorse
of one of the original returns for Norfolk in the _Testa_ (p.
ccxxiv.).[533]
The view I advance at once explains and is confirmed by the remarkable
allusion to this Inquest in the ‘Annals of Waverley’:
(1212) Idem (rex) scripsit vicecomitibus ut _per singulos
hundredos_ facerent homines jurare quæ terræ essent de
dominico prædecessorum suorum regum antiquitus, et qualiter a
manibus regum exierint, et qui eas modo tenent et pro quibus
servitiis.
There can, in my opinion, be no question whatever that this refers to
the writ ordering the great Inquest of service in 1212. This is printed
in the ‘Testa’ (p. 54), and as an appendix to the ‘Red Book’ (p.
cclxxxv.). It is too lengthy to be quoted entire, but in it are found
these words:
De tenementis omnibus quæ antiquitus de nobis aut de
progenitoribus nostris regibus Angliæ teneri solent, quæ sint
data vel alienata ... et nomina illorum qui ea teneant et per
quod servitium.
The only difference is that the writ leaves the method of inquest to
the sheriff’s discretion (“sicut melius inquiri poterit”) while the
chronicler says it was to be made Hundred by Hundred, which, as we have
seen, was probably the method adopted.
In the ‘Testa’ the writ is not dated, but the copy printed by Mr. Hall
is dated June 1 (1212) at Westminster. This seems but short notice
for a return due on June 25, but it is remarkable that the ‘Annals of
Waverley’ mention it in conjunction with a writ dated June 7, which
certainly favours the statement. This latter writ directs an enquiry as
to the ecclesiastical benefices held under gift of the prelates lately
exiled from the realm.[534] It is remarkable that the Worcester returns
to the great Inquest of service in 1212 are followed by a return made
to such an enquiry:
Inquisicio ecclesiarum. Maugerius episcopus dedit ecclesiam
de Rippel’ Willelmo de Bosco clerico suo et vicariam ejusdem
ecclesie dedit Ricardo de Sancto Paterno clerico suo. Qui
Ricardus reddit predicto Willelmo x marcas de pensione. Ecclesia
autem integra valet per annum L marcas.
Idem episcopus dedit ecclesiam de Hambur’ juxta Wych magistro
Ricardo de Cirencestra, que valet per annum x marcas (‘Testa,’
p. 44).
Bishop Mauger died in the very month of the Inquest (June, 1212).
The Notts and Derbyshire returns (p. 18) include two similar entries
relating to the archbishop of York, and those for Somerset and Dorset
contain two at least relating to the bishop of Bath (pp. 161 _b_, 162
_a_). The Sussex and Surrey returns similarly contain two entries
(p. 226 _a_) relating to Surrey churches to which the archbishop
of Canterbury had presented. In this last case the annual value of
the livings is deposed to, it should be noted, by six men of each
parish.[535]
Having now dealt with Middlesex and Worcestershire, I pass to
Lancashire, another county cited by Mr. Hall for comparison. The
magnificent return for this county in 1212[536] is noteworthy for
several reasons. In the first place, it is headed:
Hec est inquisicio facta per sacramentum fidelium militum
de tenementis datis et alienatis infra Limam in comitatu
Lancastrie, scilicet per Rogerum Gerneth, etc., etc.
This is a good illustration of the principle of “sworn inquest.” In
the second, it leads off with the entry: “Gilbertus filius Reinfri
tenet feodum unius militis.” Although this was a well-known man, _jure
uxoris_ a local magnate, the ‘Red Book’ text leads off with the gross
corruption: “Gilfridus filius Rumfrai i militem” (568). Mr. Hall,
in his index (p. 1183), identifies him with the “Galfridus filius
Reinfrei” of another ‘Red Book’ return (p. 599)--where the ‘Testa’ has,
rightly, “Gilbertus”--and fails to recognise in him the above Gilbert.
This is a striking comment on his views expressed at the outset as to
the inferiority of the ‘Testa’ text. So also is the fact that the ‘Red
Book’ reads “Thomas de Elgburgo” at the foot of the same page, where
the ‘Testa’ has “Thomas de Goldebur[go]” (p. 406), the correctness of
the latter reading being proved by the “Thomas de Goldeburgo” of the
‘Red Book’ itself (p. 69) in its extract from the Pipe Roll of 1187.
Yet the editor ignores the ‘Testa’ form, and gives ‘Elgburgo’ in the
Index.[537]
A third point is that the ‘Red Book’ compresses here into a skeleton
nearly thirteen columns of the closely printed ‘Testa de Nevill.’ The
text of the latter is of value not only for its wealth of information
and its witness to the detailed and far-reaching character of this
Inquest, but for such expressions as “pro herede Theobaldi Walteri qui
est in custodia sua” (_i.e._ regis). Theobald had died more than five
years before the Inquest was made; and yet in the ‘Red Book’ text he
appears as the living tenant.
This instance is of some importance in its bearing on apparent
contrasts in the ‘Testa’ and ‘Red Book’ versions. For Mr. Hall,
believing them to represent two successive returns, observes that
In the Inquisitions ... of the years 1210–11 entered in the Red
Book of the Exchequer, Walter Tosard is returned as holding his
land in Banningham.... In the original return, dated 1212, from
which the earliest list of Feudal services in _Testa de Nevill_
was compiled, we find that Walter Tosard _held_ this serjeanty,
and that Avicia Tosard still holds it (p. ccxxviii.).
The apparent discrepancy of the two returns is explained, exactly as in
the case of Theobald Walter, by the fact that the full return mentioned
Walter Tosard as dead, while the brief and inaccurate abstract of it,
in the Red Book of the Exchequer, gives his name as if he were alive.
Passing over the elaborate entry for Bradwell, Essex,[538] the two
versions of which, it will be found, are clearly derived from the same
original, I pass, in conclusion, to the return for Northumberland
(‘Testa,’ 392–3). Although not among the counties cited above by Mr.
Hall, its return to the “Inquisicio facta de tenementis, etc., que
sunt data vel alienata,” etc.,[539] is specially full and valuable
for comparison. Its text appears to reproduce the original _in
extenso_. Now any one comparing this return with the meagre list
in the ‘Liber Rubeus’ (pp. 562–4) will perceive at once that the
latter is derived from the same original. The names occur in identical
order. The only discrepancy is that the ‘Red Book’ shows us “Sewale
filius Henrici” in possession of land (Matfen and Nafferton)--held by
the interesting serjeanty of being coroner--while the ‘Testa’ reads
“Philippus de Ulkotes tenet terram que fuit Sewall’ filii Henrici.” It
might be urged, as is done by Mr. Hall in the case of the serjeanties
and the Boulogne Inquest (pp. ccxxviii., 575), that this proves the
‘Testa’ return to be the later of the two. But here, again, the real
explanation is that--as in the case of Lancashire, where Theobald
Walter’s name, we saw, is given in the ‘Red Book’ when he was dead--the
appearance of Sewal is merely due to the carelessness, in the ‘Red
Book,’ of the scribe. This, indeed, is evident from his similar
appearance in a list which is, according to Mr. Hall, later than
either.[540] How essential it is to collate these parallel lists is
shown by the very first entry, relating to the interesting tenure of
earl Patrick (of Dunbar). According to the ‘Testa’ (the right reading)
he held “iij villas in theynagio.” The ‘Red Book’ makes him hold “iii
milites (!) in theynagio,” a reading which its editor accepts without
question. Another no less striking correction is afforded by the
‘Testa,’ in its entry relating to the porter of Bamborough Castle and
his tenure: “Robertus Janitor de Bamburg’ tenet.” In Mr. Hall’s text we
find him as “Robertus, junior” (!), and, as such, the unfortunate man
is indexed, although he appears elsewhere, both in the ‘Red Book’ and
the ‘Testa,’ as “Robertus Portarius.”[541] From these instances it will
be evident that though (in the printed text at least) the ‘Testa’ is
not perfect, the ‘Red Book’ list, for Northumberland, is, when compared
with it, worthless.
Indeed, the marvellously elaborate returns for Somerset and Dorset,
Lincolnshire, Lancashire, etc., printed in the ‘Testa de Nevill,’ with
which the meagre lists in the ‘Liber Rubeus’ cannot be compared for an
instant, make one read with absolute amazement Mr. Hall’s statement,
when comparing the two, that
one or the other is in its present form lamentably incomplete.
This deficiency chiefly exists on the side of the _Testa_,
for it will be evident at once that the isolated and
fragmentary membranes which formed the sole surviving contents
of Nevill’s _Testa_ in the reign of Edward I. cannot be
satisfactorily compared with the relatively complete returns
preserved in the Red Book (p. ccxxiv.).
It is evident that the editor has no conception how many and how long
are the returns in the ‘Testa’ relating to this great Inquest.[542]
This may be due to his conception that they are there headed “De
Testa de Nevill” (p. ccxxv.), an idea which he repeated in a lengthy
communication to the ‘Athenæum’ (10th Sept., 1898) on the “Testa de
Nevill.” Mr. Hall wrote:
The really important point about the whole matter is one which
seems to have been entirely overlooked, namely that not only
does the title ‘Testa de Nevill’ refer to certain antique lists
alone, which, indeed, form but a small percentage of the whole
register, but that the greater part of the lists thus headed
appear to have been made at a certain date in the fourteenth
year of John.... ‘_De_ Testa de Nevill’ is the invariable
heading of these lists (p. 354).
The very point of the matter is that, on the contrary, the greater
portion of these lists have no such heading, but are hidden away among
later returns, from which they can only be disentangled by careful and
patient labour.[543] The result of my researches is that I believe the
printed ‘Testa’ to contain no fewer than a hundred columns (amounting
to nearly an eighth of its contents) representing returns to this
Inquest. At the close of this paper I append a list of these columns,
of which only thirty-eight are headed (or included in the portion
headed) “De testa de Nevill.”
To resume. For the great Inquest of 1212 (14 John) we have (1) mention
in a chronicle, (2) the writ directing it to be made, (3) the record
of a sworn verdict of jurors who made it. For the alleged Inquests of
1210–12 (12 and 13 John) we have nothing at all.[544] We have, further,
the fact that, when collated, the returns said to belong to these
“independent” Inquests are found to be clearly derived from a single
original. In spite, therefore, of the ‘Red Book’ and its editor, it may
safely be asserted that there was but one Inquest, that of the 14th
year, the returns to which were handed in on 25th June (1212).
Thus “the remarkable circumstance,” as Mr. Hall terms it (p. ccxxiii.),
that the ‘Testa’ compilers know nothing of “the original returns of
the 12th and 13th years,” while, “on the other hand, the scribe of the
‘Red Book’ had not access to the returns of the 14th year,” is at once
accounted for: they both used the same returns, those of 1212.[545]
As my criticism has, at times, been deemed merely destructive, I may
point out that, here at least, it has established the facts about an
Inquest worthy to be named, in future, by historians in conjunction
with those of 1086 and 1166, while the rough list I shall append of
its returns, as printed in the ‘Testa,’ will, one may hope, enable
its evidence to be more generally used than it has been hitherto. The
unfortunate description of the ‘Testa,’ on its title-page, as “_temp._
Henry III. and Edward I.,” has greatly obscured its character and
misled the ordinary searcher.
Historically speaking, this Inquest may be viewed from two standpoints.
Politically, it illustrates John’s exactions by its effort to revive
rights of the Crown alleged to have lapsed.[546] Institutionally, it
is of great interest, not only as an instance of “the sworn inquest”
employed on a vast scale, but also for its contrast to the inquest
of knights in 1166, and its points of resemblance to the Domesday
inquest of 1086. Of far wider compass than the former--for it dealt in
detail with the towns[547]--it was carried out on a totally different
principle. Instead of each tenant-in-chief making his own return of his
fees and sending it in separately, the sheriff conducted the enquiry,
Hundred by Hundred, for the county; and out of these returns the feudal
lists had to be subsequently constructed by the officials. Lincolnshire
is not among the counties named by Mr. Hall for comparison, but it
shows us well how the inquest was made Wapentake by Wapentake, and
then the list of fees within the county extracted from the returns and
grouped under Honours. This, I believe, is what was done in Middlesex
also.[548] It is noteworthy that in the case of Middlesex the returns
of 1212 were made the basis for collecting the aid “for the marriage of
the king’s sister,”[549] in 1235, the same personal names occurring in
both lists. If, as this implies, they formed a definitive assessment,
we obtain a striking explanation of the fact that 1212, as Mr. Hall
observes, seems to mark a terminal break in Swereford’s work (pp.
lxii.-iii.). Personally, however, I am not sure that “the Scutages,”
as Mr. Hall asserts, “concluded abruptly” in 1212. My reckoning being
different from his, I make the last scutage dealt with by Swereford to
be that which is recorded on John’s 13th year roll, that is, the roll
of Michaelmas, 1211.
The following list represents an attempt to identify the returns to
this great Inquest in the ‘Testa,’ and to give the relative abstracts
in the ‘Liber Rubeus.’ Out of 39 English counties (then recognised),
the ‘Testa’ seems to have returns or fragments for 25, and the ‘Liber
Rubeus’ abstracts for 31.
NOTTS AND DERBYSHIRE.
Testa, pp. 17_b_-19_a_. Liber Rubeus, p. 565.
NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.
Testa, p. 36. Liber Rubeus, p. 532.
WORCESTERSHIRE.
Testa, pp. 43–4. Liber Rubeus, p. 566.
SALOP AND STAFFORDSHIRE.
Testa, pp. 54–6. Liber Rubeus,[550] p. 509.
HEREFORDSHIRE.
Testa, pp. 69_b_-70_b_. Liber Rubeus, p. 495.
GLOUCESTERSHIRE.
Testa, pp. 77_a_.
OXFORDSHIRE AND BERKSHIRE.
Testa, pp. 115,[551] 128_a_-129_a_,[552] 129_a_-131_b_,[553]
133_b_-134_b_.[554]
SOMERSET AND DORSET.
Testa, pp. 160_b_-166_a_. Liber Rubeus, p. 544.
DEVON.
Testa, pp. 194–195.
SURREY.
Testa, pp. 224_b_-226_a_. Liber Rubeus, p. 560.
SUSSEX.
Testa, pp. 226_b_[555]-227_b_. Liber Rubeus, p. 553.
HANTS.
Testa, pp. 236_a_,[556] 239_b_.[557]
ESSEX AND HERTS.
Testa, pp. 269_b_[558]-271_a_.[559] Liber Rubeus, p. 498.
NORFOLK AND SUFFOLK.
Testa, pp. 293_a_-296_a_. Liber Rubeus, p. 475.
LINCOLNSHIRE.
Testa, pp. 334_b_[560]-348_a_.[561] Liber Rubeus, p. 514.
MIDDLESEX.
Testa, p. 361. Liber Rubeus, p. 541.
CUMBERLAND.
Testa, pp. 379_a_[562]-380_a_. Liber Rubeus, p. 493.
NORTHUMBERLAND.
Testa, pp. 392_a_-393_b_.[563] Liber Rubeus, pp. 562–4.
LANCASHIRE.
Testa, p. 401_b_-408_a_. Cf. Liber Rubeus, p. 568.
The above list can only be tentative, and does not profess to be
exhaustive. It is believed, however, that genealogists and topographers
will find it of considerable assistance.
XIII
Castle-ward and Cornage
I propose to deal in this chapter with two subjects which are wholly
distinct, but which it has now been proposed, by a singular confusion,
to connect. Speaking of certain miscellaneous returns in the ‘Red Book
of the Exchequer,’ Mr. Hall writes:
The first group in importance comprises the so-called
Castle-guard Rents,’ lists of military services in connection
with the Constableship of Dover Castle ... the Constableship of
Windsor Castle, the Wardship of Bamburgh Castle, and the Cornage
Rents of Northumberland (p. ccxxxvi.).
The corrupt but curious list of the Dover “wards” and their fees is
printed virtually in duplicate on pages 613, 717, though dated by the
editor in the former instance ‘1211–12’ throughout, and in the latter,
‘1261–2,’ and even ‘_Temp._ Edw. I.’ (pp. 721–2). The first of these,
from internal evidence, is probably the right date; the remaining list
(pp. 706 _et seq._), though headed in the MS. 46 Hen. III., is merely
this old list rearranged, with a money payment substituted for the
military service. I mention this because, as printed, these lists are
most misleading to any one unacquainted with their real date.
The ‘Constable’s Honour,’ for which, alone, we have six or seven
slightly varying returns, is one of the most interesting in the whole
Book, and leads me to say something on this important subject, on which
a wholly erroneous belief has hitherto prevailed.
The first point to which I desire to direct attention is that the
nine wards (_custodiæ_), named in the ‘Red Book’ lists--The
Constable’s, ‘Abrincis,’ Foubert de Dover,[564] Arsic, Peverel,
Maminot, Port, Crevequer, and Adam Fitz William[565]--are all
reproduced in the names still attached to towers, including even
Fulbert’s Christian name. This coincidence of testimony leads one to
believe that these names must have become fixed at a very early period,
and to enquire what that period was. Looking at the history of the
families named, it seems probable that this period was not later, at
least, than the reign of Henry II.
But it is in the Constable’s “Ward” that the interest centres. For the
time-honoured belief, preserved by Lyon, and reproduced by Mr. Clark,
is that “three barons of the house of Fiennes held the office under the
Conqueror, Rufus, and Henry I.” After stating that these barons “held
the office of constable” under Henry II., Mr. Clark informs us that “of
these lords, the last, James Fiennes, was constable at the accession
of Richard I., and in 1191 received, as a prisoner in the castle,
Geoffrey, Henry II.’s natural son.”[566] Professor Burrows repeats,
though guardedly, the old story:
William (I.) is now said to have conferred the guardianship of
the coast, as an hereditary fief on a certain John de Fiennes,
whose name, however, does not appear in any contemporary record.
John was to do service for his lands as Constable of the Castle
and Warden of the Ports.... The office of Constable and Warden
ceased to be hereditary in the reign of Richard I.[567]
Mr. Hall has now revived the old legend in full:
In the valuable register formerly belonging to the Priory
of Merton ... a similar but shorter list is found, with an
interesting description of these services, which will be
presently referred to (p. ccxxxvii.).
The constitutional significance of the tenure itself has not
been perfectly realised. The Merton Register mentioned above
informs us, under the heading “De Wardis Castri Dovorræ,”
that the Conqueror granted the constableship of the castle
there to the Lord of Fienes, with the service of fifty-six
knights, who kept guard each month in turn, some four or
five at once. Besides these, other knights were assigned
to that constableship, for so many weeks in the year, by
the neighbouring Lords of Chilham and Folkestone, and other
barons mentioned in the later returns. Thus the Castle-ward
was performed down to the reign of John, when it was thought
advisable that such an important fortress should be committed to
the keeping of a royal constable and a permanent garrison....
Hubert de Burgh was appointed constable during pleasure, and the
office has continued to the present day in the patronage of the
Crown (p. ccxxxviii.).
[NOTE.] William de Fesnes, the last baronial Constable,
appears to have received the honour of Wendover by way of
compensation (‘Testa,’ ii. 158).
Now, how much truth is there in this story? Fifty-six knights, we see,
are assigned to John de Fiennes, as first Constable, and fifty-six
knights’ fees (plus or minus 1/10 fee) are assigned in the ‘Liber
Rubeus’ to the “Warda Constabularii.” But the history of these fees,
the “Honor Constabularii,” can be traced with absolute certainty. They
are those which had last been held by Henry de Essex, “the Constable,”
whose tragic fate is familiar, which had been previously held by Robert
de Ver “the Constable,” in right of his wife, a Montfort, and the
possession of which can be traced back by Domesday to no other than
Hugh de Montfort.[568] We learn then that “the Honour of the Constable”
(which we should not otherwise have known) was connected with the
custody of Dover Castle, the “clavis et repagulum Angliæ”; and we learn
more. For when we turn to the story of the attack on Dover Castle
in 1067, we find Hugh de Montfort “the immediate commander of the
castle”;[569] and are thus able to trace the “Warda Constabularii” back
to the Conquest itself.
Thus the legend of John de Fiennes and his heirs, constables of the
castle, together with its “constitutional significance,” is blown, as
it were, into space, and should never, henceforth, be heard.
The “Honour of the Constable” passed to the Crown on the forfeiture
of Henry of Essex (1163); and as for the alleged action of “James
Fienes” as constable in 1191, it is well known that the constable at
the time was a brother-in-law of Longchamp, the king’s representative.
I have suggested in a paper on “Faramus of Boulogne”[570] a possible
origin for the Fiennes story in the castle being held by Faramus
at the close of Stephen’s reign, a fact which may account for the
late tradition about “quodam comite Boloniæ qui erat ejusdem Castri
Constabularius.”[571] For the Fienes family were his heirs, through his
daughter; and it was through him, and not on the ground suggested by
Mr. Hall, that they obtained Wendover. To Faramus himself, however, it
may have been given in compensation.
* * * * *
Thus far I have been dealing with a question of castle-ward. I now pass
to the ‘cornage rents’ and to the new theory of their origin. This
theory is one of the features of Mr. Hall’s Introduction, in which he
devotes to it ten pages; and it follows immediately on his remarks upon
“the constableship of Dover.”
As difficult a subject as ‘Scutage,’ and one on which less has been
written, the origin and character of “cornage” are problems as yet
unsolved. The brilliant pen of Professor Maitland has attacked them in
a paper on “Northumbrian tenures”;[572] but he cannot tell us more,
virtually, than we know already, namely, that the term points to
cattle, and is not derived, as Littleton in his ‘Tenures’ and the older
antiquaries held, from the service of blowing a horn.
Mr. Hall, however, “hazards” the new and startling theory that the
payment known by this name represents a commutation of castle-ward
previously due from the drengs and thegns of the Northern marches. For
this, it would seem, his only ground is the entry in the ‘Red Book’ of
a list of Northumbrian cornage payments in close proximity to lists of
castle-ward services. On this slender foundation is built an edifice
of guesses, such as distinguishes this strange work from any other in
the Rolls Series. They are prefaced, in their order, as usual, thus:
if we might venture to disregard ... we may suspect that ... the
impression remains that ... May we not then conjecture that ...
it will now be possible to hazard some theory ... It is at least
conceivable that ... will perhaps suggest the theory, etc.,
etc.... (pp. ccxlii.-ccxlviii.).
Rejecting “the accepted definition of cornage as a mere seignorial
due in respect of the pasturage of cattle,” Mr. Hall explains that
it rests on “a radical misconception,” namely, on “the argument that
the references to military service performed by” the Cumberland
cornage “tenants are later interpolations in the reign of Edward I.,”
whereas, as he observes, they are mentioned in a list of about the end
of John’s reign. The criticism is curiously characteristic. For, on
turning to Professor Maitland’s paper (p. 629), we find not a hint of
“interpolation”; he has merely--misled, no doubt, by the title page of
the printed ‘Testa’--mistaken a list of John’s reign for one of “Edward
I.’s time.” And, so far from assigning to that period the first mention
of this service, he refers us, in the same passage, to its mention in
1238, when, as he actually observes, it “looks like an ancient trait.”
The misconception, therefore, is not his, but Mr. Hall’s.
In the manuscript itself we find the ward service of Newcastle and the
details of the Northumberland cornage occupying a single page (fo.
195 _d_). But this circumstance, for which I shall account fully
below, in no way connects the two. On the contrary, we find eleven
territorial units here entered as paying “cornage” in addition to
their payments for castle-ward. The two payments, it will be observed,
could not both be commutations of the same thing.[573] It is quite
clear that, in Cumberland, all who held “per cornagium” were bound,
apart from the payment of that due, to march respectively in the van
and in the rear when the king was invading or retreating from Scotland,
a duty for which they were, obviously, qualified by their local
knowledge; but this had absolutely nothing to do with castle-ward, nor
is even this special service mentioned in the case of Northumberland.
Cornage, from the time we first meet with it, appears in our records as
a money payment, not as a military service, and even Mr. Hall admits
that the name is derived from horned beasts, unlike the ‘ward penny’ of
the south, in which he would seek its parallel, and of which the name
leaves us in no doubt as to its nature. The institution of cornage,
therefore, is, we shall find, as obscure as ever, although there is
some evidence, unknown, it seems, to Professor Maitland as it is to Mr.
Hall. Its historical importance is beyond question.
Of the cornage of Northumberland, as recorded in the ‘Red Book,’ the
editor writes that “it is of the highest importance to trace its
earlier history in the records of the Exchequer.” It can, as he says,
be traced back to 1164; but I cannot accept his suggestion as to why it
then made its appearance. One must turn, for comparison, to that of
Cumberland, concerning which we read as follows:
In each succeeding year-roll, from the beginning of the reign of
Henry II., the sheriff of Cumberland had rendered his account
for the Neatgild of the county. The amount of this tribute was
fixed at £80.... But we have no means of showing how the £80 was
made up, because the sheriff answered for it in a lump sum, and
no particulars of his account have survived as in the case of
the Northumberland list happily preserved in the Red Book.
But this Neatgild (or cornage) can be traced back much further, namely,
to the year-roll of 1130, and even earlier. It was £85 8_s._ 8_d._
under Henry I., and over £80 under Henry II.; and details of sums
paid in respect of it are duly found, not only in the ‘Red Book’ (pp.
493–4),[574] but also in the ‘Testa de Nevill.’ Moreover, the cornage
of Northumberland as well was answered for “in a lump sum,” and this
leads me to explain the entry of the Northumbrian lists. Mr. Hall has
failed to observe that his manuscript adds up the cornage wrongly, and
is even guilty of a further error in asserting that this erroneous
total is “xxii den. plus quam alii solebant respondere,” its real
excess being £1 1_s._ 10_d._[575] Apart from its obvious bearing on the
character and value of the manuscript, this error has misled the editor
into stating that the sums entered, “less the pardons of the Prior
of Tynemouth and the King of Scots, make up the charge of £20 for the
county.” On the contrary, the grand total is £21 3_s._ 10_d._, although
the sheriffs were only liable for the “lump sum” of £20. Why is this?
It is because Robert “de Insula,” to whom we owe the list, held the
shire “ut custos.” This most important Exchequer phrase, which the
editor must have overlooked on the roll, can be traced back, at least,
as far as 1130. It means that the Crown had put its own man in office,
and was thus able to get at the details of the payment, for which
the normal sheriff was only liable in a “lump sum.” This is why the
opportunity was taken to set these details on record. This explanation
applies also to the details of Newcastle ward service immediately
preceding the cornage payments. The editor might have learnt from the
Pipe Rolls that the sheriff was normally charged, in respect of this
payment, with £32 4_s._ 5_d._ gross, and £28 14_s._ 5_d._ net, which
latter sum he was entitled to retain for his wardenship of the castle.
But Robert, as “custos,” recorded the receipts as amounting to £33, and
was consequently called upon in 1267 to account for £4 5_s._ 7_d._(the
difference between £33 and £28 14_s._ 5_d._) “de cremento wardarum
Novi Castri de anno xlix° sicut recepit.” The entry, therefore, of
both lists can be traced to Robert’s position “ut custos” in 49 Hen.
III. Lastly, the statement that “the cornage of Westmoreland can also
be traced on the rolls, but it was of very trifling value,” seems
unfortunate in view of the fact that it was, when it first appears,
nearly thrice as large as the whole cornage of Northumberland.
That I may not close with a negative result, I append two remarkable
charters from the MS. cartulary of St. Bees, which show us the Cumbrian
Noutegeld being actually paid in cows to William earl of Albemarle,
as lord of Coupland, which barony was exempt from its payment to the
Crown.[576]
Willelmus comes Albemarlie archiepiscopo Ebor[acensi] et
capitulo et omnibus matricis ecclesie filiis salutem. Noverit
paternitas vestra me dedisse et concessisse deo et sancte Marie
et sancte Bege in Copelandia et omnibus (_sic_) vi vaccas
in perpetuam elemosinam reddendas anno omni quo meum Noutegeld
debuerit fieri. Hanc autem donacionem feci pro animabus omnium
antecessorum meorum et antecessorum uxoris mee Cecilie.
Testibus, etc....
* * * * *
Willelmus comes Albemarlie omnibus hominibus suis tam futuris
quam presentibus salutem. Sciatis quod dedi et presenti carta
confirmavi Deo et sancte Marie et sancte Bege et monachis de
sancta Bega vi vaccas de meo Nautegeld (_sic_) unoquoque anno,
quando accipio Nautegeld in Copuland, etc.[577] ...
Now it is a most interesting fact that in Durham also we find, as in
Coupland, a payment in cows (“vaccas de metride”) made by townships
in connection with their payment of “cornage.”[578] From the above
important charters, it would seem that the two dues went together.
In Durham there is a classical passage for the “cornage” proper,
quoted by those who have dealt with “cornage,” but not by Mr. Hall.
In a charter of Henry I., which I assign to 1128–9, he speaks of
“cornagium de Bortona ... _scilicet de unoquoque animali_ ij _d._”[579]
This is precisely the source of “cornage” which Mr. Hall desires to
“disregard.” And if further proof were needed of the non-identity
of “cornage” with castle-ward, it is found in the fact that, as in
Northumberland, both dues existed simultaneously in Durham, vills
which paid cornage being also liable to provide men for castle-ward
(“castlemanni”).[580]
XIV
Bannockburn
As Sir Henry Howorth has so truly observed, in a presidential address
to the members of the Archæological Institute, the transition from the
chronicle to the record as a source of mediæval history is one of the
most striking and hopeful features in recent historical research. And
in no respect, perhaps, has the study of original records modified
more profoundly the statements of mediæval chroniclers than in the
matter of the figures they contain. Dealing with the introduction
of knight-service into England, I was led to give some instances
in point,[581] and specially to urge that “sixty thousand” occurs
repeatedly as a conventional number ludicrously remote from the truth.
It is now, I believe, generally accepted that my estimate of about five
thousand for the number of knights’ fees in England[582] is nearer
the truth than the “sixty thousand” which, in his History, Mr. Green
accepted. But we still read in ‘Social England’ (i. 373) that William
I. “is believed to have landed ... with at least 60,000 men”; nor
did Mr. Freeman himself reject the statement of Orderic that “sixty
thousand” men were gathered on Salisbury Plain for the “Mickle Gemót”
of August 1, 1086. We who saw, only last summer, the difficulty of
there assembling a force scarcely so large, even with all the modern
facilities of transport and organization, can realize, more forcibly
than ever, the incredibility of the fact.
“Stephen Segrave,” Dr. Stubbs reminds us, “the minister of Henry III.,
reckoned 32,000 as the number” of knights’ fees; and even so late as
1371, ministers allowed a parliamentary grant to be calculated on the
belief that there were 40,000 parishes in England, when there were, as
a fact, less than 9,000.[583] So too, as is well known, Fitz Ralph,
archbishop of Armagh, declared at Avignon, that at Oxford, in his
early days, there were 30,000 students, although it is probable that
they cannot have exceeded 3,000 in number.[584] It is even said that
Wycliffe doubled Fitz Ralph’s estimate.
There is nothing, therefore, strange in the fact that two centuries and
a half after the Norman Conquest, we still find absurd numbers assigned
to armies in the field and accepted with thoughtless readiness, even by
modern historians. This, we shall see, has been the case, among many
other battles, with that of Bannockburn (1314).
The ultimate “authority” for the numbers engaged at this ever memorable
fight is Barbour’s Brus. Of Edward that romancer wrote:
He had of fechtaris with hym tha
Ane hundreth thousand men and ma
And fourty thousand war of tha
Armyt on hors, bath hede and hand
And zeit of thai war thre thousand
With helit hors in-till playn male
Till mak the front of the battale
And fifty thousand of archerys
He had, forouten the hoblerys;
With men on fut and small rangale.
In accordance with this statement we read further of the king, that
His folk he delt in battalis ten
In ilkane war weill ten thousand.
Of the Scots we are told that:
Of fectand men I trow thai ware
Thretty thousand, and sum deill mare
* * * * *
Weill thretty thousand men and ma
Mak we four battalis of all thai.
* * * * *
The quethir thai war thretty thousand.
On the English side we have a statement in the ‘Vita Edwardi Secundi.’
It is there asserted, of the host marching on Stirling, that
Erant autem armatorum amplius quam duo milia, excepta peditum
turba copiosa.[585]
The same authority states that Bruce
Circiter quadraginta milia hominum secum produxit.... Ibant
etiam quasi sepes densa conserti, nec leviter potuit talis turba
penetrari.[586]
Let us now see how modern writers have dealt with the numbers present,
remembering that the character and issue of the battle turn largely on
the vast numbers assigned to the English host.
In the ‘Dictionary of National Biography’ (1886) Dr. Æneas Mackay
adopts the traditional view of the English numbers, following Barbour,
indeed, blindly:
On 11 June the whole available forces of England, with a
contingent from Ireland, numbering in all about 100,000 men, of
whom 50,000 were archers, and 40,000 cavalry, were mustered at
Berwick.[587]
A far abler and more cautious writer, Mr. Joseph Bain, F.S.A. Scot., in
his ‘Calendar of Documents relating to Scotland’ (1887), reckoned that
“the whole English army probably did not exceed 50,000.”[588] Against
Hailes on the Scottish side, he supports Hume, who, he writes:
founded on the writs enrolled in the _Foedera_, addressed to the
sheriffs of twelve English counties, two earls, and five barons
for the foot, who numbered in all 21,540. This is undoubtedly
good authority, for ... the Patent Rolls of the time are not
defective. Contingents from all the English shires were not
invariably summoned. In the writs in question the men of the
northern and midland counties, which incurred most danger from
the Scots, were summoned (p. xx.).
From Mr. Bain I turn to our latest authority, Mr. Oman’s ‘History of
the Art of War.’
To the memorable Scottish victory Mr. Oman, as we might expect, devotes
special attention (pp. 570–579). He attributes “the most lamentable
defeat which an English army ever suffered” to two fatal errors, of
which one “was the crowding such a vast army on to a front of no more
than two thousand yards” (p. 579). His argument, in detail, is this:
Two thousand yards of frontage only affords comfortable space
for 1,500 horsemen or 3,000 foot-soldiers abreast. This was well
enough for the main line of the Scottish host, formed in three
battles of perhaps 25,000 men in all, _i.e._ eight or nine deep
in continuous line. But, allowing for the greater space required
for the cavalry, the English were far too many for such a front,
with the ten thousand horse and 50,000 or 60,000 foot which they
may have mustered.
The result of this fact was that from the very beginning of the
battle the English were crowded and crushed together and wholly
unable to manœuvre (p. 575).
In his first work (1885) Mr. Oman had adopted “100,000 men” as the
number of Edward’s host; in 1895 it had become “an army that is rated
at nearly 100,000 men by the chronicler.”[589] In 1898 we learn that
“the estimate of a hundred thousand men, which the Scottish chroniclers
give, is no doubt exaggerated, but that the force was very large is
shown by the genuine details which have come down to us” (p. 573).
These “genuine details” prove to be the figures in the ‘Foedera,’ on
which Mr. Bain relied. Mr. Oman arrives at his figures thus:
Edward II. had brought a vast host with him.... There have been
preserved of the orders which Edward sent out for the raising of
this army only those addressed to the sheriffs of twelve English
counties, seven Marcher barons, and the Justices of North and
South Wales. Yet these account for twenty-one thousand five
hundred men, though they do not include the figures of any of
the more populous shires, such as Norfolk, Suffolk, Kent, or
Middlesex. The whole must have amounted to more than 50,000 men
(p. 573).
To the numbers of Edward’s host he attaches so great an importance that
he gives the details, from Rymer, in a note. I make the total, myself,
to be 21,540.[590] It is Mr. Oman’s extraordinary delusion that the
other English counties were similarly called on for troops, but that
the orders have not been “preserved.” On the strength of this illusion
alone he adds some 30,000 men to the English host! A glance at Rymer’s
list, as given in his own pages, is sufficient to dispel that illusion.
As Mr. Bain correctly implies, the counties called on for troops form
a compact group, of which Warwick was the southernmost. Moreover, even
within that group, the southern counties were evidently called on for
much less than the northernmost, Warwick and Leicester only sending 500
men, while Northumberland and Durham were called on to supply 4,000, as
was also Yorkshire. We have only to turn to the ‘Rotuli Scotiæ’[591]
for 1314 to learn that the writs originally issued (_i.e._ in March)
for the Bannockburn campaign summoned no more than 6,500 men, and these
from the counties “beyond Trent” alone.[592] As the peril increased
subsequent writs called for a further 6,000 men from these counties,
and extended the net so as to obtain 3,000 from Lincolnshire, 500 from
Warwickshire and Leicestershire, and 500 from Lancashire (previously
omitted); this, with 4,940 men from Wales and its marches, made up the
total.
When Edward III. arrayed his host, twenty-five years later, for
the French war, he only asked for 500 foot from Northumberland (as
against 2,500), and 1,000 from Yorkshire, but from Warwickshire with
Leicestershire he exacted 480. These figures speak for themselves.
Any one of ordinary intelligence can see that the forces on these two
occasions were raised on entirely different principles, Northumberland
being called on for five times as many men in 1314 as in 1339, while
Warwickshire and Leicester supplied almost as many in the latter as
in the former year. And yet Mr. Oman actually makes the comparison
himself (p. 593), and prints the numbers in detail for both occasions
without any comprehension that this was so. Indeed, he bases on his
misapprehension a theory that as, at the later date (1339), the quotas
were never more than a third of those demanded for Bannockburn (1314),
a comparatively picked force was secured.
We note that the Commissions of Array in the latter year were
directed to levy only from about one-third to one-fifth of
the numbers which the sheriffs had been told to provide in
the former year. They were, of course, individually better in
proportion to the greater care which could be taken in selecting
them.[593]
We have seen that, on the contrary, in Warwickshire and Leicestershire,
the number summoned was almost the same, and that the above theory is,
therefore, another delusion. In 1339 the proportion varied from 20
per cent. to 96 per cent. of the numbers summoned in 1314, and did so,
as we have seen, on a geographical system. Mr. Oman bases his above
assertion on a note in which four lines contain four direct mistakes.
It asserts that Yorkshire sent “six thousand,” Lincolnshire “four
thousand,” Warwick “five hundred,” and Leicester “five hundred,” in
1314, when the right numbers, as given by himself on page 573 of the
same volume, were: Yorkshire _four_ thousand, Lincolnshire _three_
thousand, and Warwick and Leicester _together_ five hundred. The result
of this astounding inaccuracy is that he fails to understand the system
of these levies in the least.
It is, no doubt, surprising that, after years of study, a writer should
produce a work intended to constitute a standard authority on mediæval
warfare, in which he has not even grasped so elementary a fact as
the raising of English armies, in the 14th century, on geographical
principles, and should consequently invent an imaginary host of nearly
30,000 men. Precisely as in 1314, the bulk of the foot for the Scottish
expedition were raised from the Northern counties, so in 1345, for the
contemplated French expedition, it was from the counties south of the
Trent that the infantry (archers) was raised.[594] But it is even more
surprising that he should substitute for this system a theory, based on
the misquotation of his own figures alone, that, in 1339, we meet with
a new system of summoning a comparatively small quota of picked men.
It is but a further instance of his grievous lack of accuracy that on
page 599 he renders the “homines armati”[595] summoned from the towns
as “seventeen hundred archers,” although he prints from Rymer, a few
pages earlier, the numbers of the foot summoned in 1339, of whom half
are distinguished as archers and half as “armati.”
One would have imagined that the fact of the host being drawn from
the northern half of England alone would have been obvious from the
dates. The orders from which Mr. Oman takes the numbers demanded were
only issued from Newminster on May 27,[596] and ordered a rendezvous
of the force at Wark (Northumberland) on June 10. The troops were to
be there on that day “armis competentibus bene muniti, ac prompti et
parati ad proficiscendum” to the immediate relief of Stirling. The time
was desperately short, and haste was enjoined (“exasperes, festines”).
Moreover, the English leaders were clearly not such fools as Mr. Oman
imagines. The “orders” state that foot are wanted because the Scots
nituntur, quantum possint, ... in locis fortibus et morosis (ubi
equitibus difficilis patebit accessus) adinvicem congregare.
Common sense tells one that 60,000 foot could not be manœuvred in such
country, and would only prove an encumbrance. Edward, therefore, only
summoned less than 22,000. As to his horse, Mr. Oman writes: if the
English “had, as is said, three thousand _equites coperti_, men-at-arms
on barded horses, the whole cavalry was probably ten thousand” (p.
575). But why? At Falkirk, sixteen years before, Edward I., he writes
(p. 565), had
the whole feudal levy of England at his back. He brought three
thousand knights on barded horses, and four thousand other
men-at-arms.
If 3,000 “barded horses” implied 4,000 other horsemen in 1298, why
should they imply 7,000 in 1314? More especially, why should they do so
when, as we have seen, the king, in summoning his foot forces, himself
described the scene of the campaign as “ubi equitibus difficilis
patebit accessus,” so that he was most unlikely to take a large force
of cavalry?[597] Estimating the horse on the Falkirk basis, the English
host cannot have amounted to more than 30,000 men instead of the 60,000
or 70,000, horse and foot, at which Mr. Oman reckons it.[598]
And what of the Scotch? Let us compare these passages:
The front between the wood There was only something
and the marsh was not much slightly more than a mile of
more than a mile broad, a space slope between the wood and the
not too great to be defended by marshes.... This was well
the _forty_[599] thousand men enough for the main line of the
whom Bruce had brought Scottish host, formed in three
together p. 571). lines of perhaps _twenty-five_
[600] thousand men in all
(p. 575).
It is true that the Scottish king had a fourth battle in reserve, but,
according to Mr. Oman’s plan, it was no larger than the others, if
so large. It would only, therefore, add some 8,000 men to the above
25,000. Where then are the 40,000?
From the numbers of the forces I now pass to their disposition on
the field. With each of his successive narratives of the battle Mr.
Oman has given us a special--and different--ground plan. In all three
of these the English ‘battles’ are shown as composed of horse and
foot,--the horse in the front of each, the foot behind. But in the
earliest of these (1885) _three_ such ‘battles’ are shown, in the
second (1895) _five_, and in the third (1898) _ten_.[601] Will the
number increase indefinitely? Again, as to the famous “pottes,” dug
as traps for the English horse. In the earliest narrative these are
described as covering the Scottish flank “to the left,” and in the
second, as dug by the Scots “on their flanks,” though in both the
ground plans they are shown in a cluster on the left flank alone. When
we turn, however, to the latest account (1898), we find them shown, no
longer on the flanks, but as a single line along the Scottish front,
and described as dug by Bruce “in front of his line,” so that they
“practically covered the whole assailable front of the Scottish host”
(p. 572).
Lastly, on that all-important point, the disposition of the English
archers, we are shown in the first ground plan the “English archers
considerably in advance of the main body,” and, indeed, almost all on
the Scottish side of the burn. In his second they are still in front
of the host, but no longer across the burn. In his third there are no
“archers” shown, and the English ‘battles’ themselves are depicted
as close up to the burn. But to realize the completeness of the
contradiction, one must place side by side these two passages:
His [Edward II.’s] most fatal The worst point of all was
mistake, however, was to place that in each corps the archers
all his archers _in the front had been placed _behind_[603] the
line_,[602] without any horsemen ... condemned from the
protecting body of horsemen first to almost entire
(‘Art of War in the Middle uselessness (‘History of the Art
Ages,’ p. 101). of War,’ p. 575).
Poor Edward! He is first made to place his archers in front of his
horsemen, and blamed for his folly in doing so; and then he is made to
place them behind, and again blamed for his folly.
It is the same with the battle of Creçy (1346). Let any one compare the
four narratives given in succession by Mr. Oman,[604] together with the
three ground plans, and he will be fairly bewildered. The only thing of
which we can be sure is that when Mr. Oman has adopted a view, he will
himself afterwards abandon it. It is the same, again, with the numbers
also. Mr. Oman, in his second narrative (as apparently in his first),
reckons the English host at some 9,300 men (6,000 archers, 2,300
men-at-arms, 1,000 Welsh). In his fourth they exceed 20,000 (11,000
archers, 3,900 men-at-arms, 5,000 or 5,500 Welsh).
Need I pursue further this endless contradiction? It has been my object
to warn the reader of Mr. Oman’s works on the Art of War to compare
his successive views before adopting a single one of them. Whether on
the field of Bannockburn or of Hastings we need a guide who knows, at
least, his own mind, and whose “cocksureness” is not proportionate to
the mutability of his views.
XV
The Marshalship of England
In his valuable essay on a document of which the origin has long been
discussed, the ‘Modus tenendi Parliamentum,’[605] M. Bémont has drawn
attention to the close association of this treatise, in the MSS. which
contain it, with the coronation of Richard II. and with a treatise on
the Marshal’s office. So close, indeed, is this association that
Coke affirme avoir vu de ce traité [the _Modus_] un exemplaire
“écrit au temps de Henri II. qui contient la manière, la forme
et l’usage de Gilbert de Scrogel, maréchal d’Angleterre, et qui
indique comment il s’acquittait alors de son office.”
M. Bémont explains that Coke confused the ‘Modus’ with the treatise on
the Marshal’s office, but this is not, we shall find, quite the right
explanation; nor is it the case that the Gilbert in question “vivait au
temps de Richard II., non de Henri II.” As Coke’s error as to Gilbert
has been very widely followed, it may be well to dispose of it once for
all by tracing it to the source of his error.
We must turn for this to two MSS., the Cottonian Nero D. vi., and the
MS. lat. 6,049 in the Bibliothèque Nationale (from which is taken
Hardy’s, and consequently Dr. Stubbs’, text of the ‘Modus.’) Although
M. Bémont has given us a brief analysis of both, he seems not to have
observed that, for all purposes, they are duplicates, giving the same
documents, as they do, in the same order. Now, the very fine Cottonian
MS., which is of the time of Richard II., contains the claims to do
service at his coronation (1377) as made before John of Gaunt sitting
as High Steward.[606] Among them was that of Margaret, daughter and
heiress of Thomas “of Brotherton,” marshal of England, who claimed to
discharge that office by her deputy. I have italicised the important
words:
Item quoad officium marescalli Anglie Margareta Marschall
Comitissa Norff’ porrexit peticionem suam coram prefato
Domino Senescallo in hec verba “A tres honure seignur le Roy
de Castille et de Leon, Duc de Lancastre, et Seneschall’
Dengleterre supplie Margarete file et heir Thomas Brotherton’
nadgaires Conte de Norff’ et mareschall dengleterre destre
accepte a loffice de mareschalcie ore al coronement nostre s^r
le Roy come a son droit heritage apres la mort le dit Thomas son
piere fesante loffice par son depute _come Gilbert Mareschall
Conte de Strogoil fist as coronement le Roy Henri second_,
cestassavoir de paiser debatz en meson le Roy au iour de son
coronement et faire liveree des herbergages et de garder les
hoesses du chambre le Roy, pernant de chescun Baron et Conte
faitz Chivaler au cel iour un palfrey ove une sele.” Supra quo
audita peticione predicta, dictum fuit pro domino Rege ibidem
quod officium illud in persona domini Regis in feodo remansit
ad assignandum et contulendum cuicumque ipsi Regi placeret. Et
supra hoc auditis tam pro domino quam pro prefata Comitissa
pluribus racionibus et allegacionibus in hac parte pro eo quod
curie quod finalis discussio negocii predicti propter temporis
brevitatem ante coronacionem predictam fieri non potuit Henricus
de Percy ex assensu et precepto ipsius Regis assignatus fuit ad
officium predictum faciendum, etc., etc. (fo. 65_d_).
We have clearly here the origin of Coke’s error, when he writes:
Many very ancient copies you may find of this Modus, one whereof
we have seen in the reign of H. 2, which contains the manner,
forme, and usage of Gilbert de Scrogel, marshall of England, in
what manner he occupied and used the said roome and office in
all his time, and how he was admitted etc. at the coronation of
H. 2 (‘Institutes,’ 4, xxi.).
For the error is only found in the above petition.
Now, it ought to be obvious that no such person as Gilbert Marshal,
earl of ‘Strogoil,’ could have existed in 1154, for the Marshals did
not inherit till a later time that Earldom, which was held in 1154 by
the house of Clare. It has indeed been suggested that for “Gilbert”
we should read “Richard,”[607] but this will not help us. For, to
secure consistency, we should have to read “Richard _de Clare_.”
Nevertheless, it has been loosely assumed, on no other evidence, that
Richard de Clare, earl of Pembroke (“Striguil”) acted as Marshal of
England at the coronation of Henry II. in 1154.[608] And on this
foundation antiquaries have raised theories to which we must return.
The real explanation is perfectly simple. On turning to fo. 86_d._
of the MS. we find an entry “de officio marescalcie,” which we can
positively identify as taken from fo. 232 of the ‘Red Book of the
Exchequer’ (p. 759) where it is found among the “services” at Queen
Eleanor’s coronation in 1236. Then turning back to Countess Margaret’s
claim (fo. 65_d_), we find that it enshrines, in Norman French, this
entry word for word. Therefore the whole error has been caused by
the words “as coronement le Roy Henri second” (1154) applied to an
entry which really related to the coronation of Queen Eleanor (1236)!
“Gilbert Mareschall Conte de Strigoil” had no existence at the former
date, but he actually held the marshal’s rod in 1236.[609]
Camden, it seems, is responsible, in the first instance, for the theory
that the office of “Marshal of England” was distinct in origin and
character from that of Marshal of the Household. Strangely enough,
in his earlier essay,[610] he made no such distinction, but, on the
contrary, stated that Roger Bigod “was he which first stiled himselfe
_marescallus Angliæ_, whereas all his predecessors used noe other
stiles than the simple addition of _marescallus_.” In his second essay
(3rd Nov., 1603)[611] he gave a list of the “Marshals of England,”
deducing the office from a grant of Stephen, who “made Gilbert Clare
earl of Pembroke and Marshal of England, with the state of inheritance,
who ... was commonly called earl of Stryghall.” Thus arose the whole
theory which Thoms, following Camden, adopts in his ‘Book of the Court’
(pp. 241, 244), namely, that the two offices were accidentally united
by the marriage of William (the) Marshal (of the Household) with
Isabel, heiress of the earls of Pembroke, “Marshals of England.”
From Thoms this theory has found its way into the ‘Complete Peerage.’
I need not here say more than that I have carefully examined the
evidence, and that, after the alleged union of the offices, there is
no trace of their being granted as more than one. When John confirmed
(20th April, 1200) the marshalship to William Marshall, it was as
magistratum maresc’ curie nostre quam magistratum Gillebertus
Marescallus Henrici Regis avi patris nostri et Johannes filius
ipsius Gilleberti disrationaverat coram predicto Rege Henrico in
curia sua.[612]
And when William’s younger son Gilbert obtained it from Henry III.,
after his brother’s death, we read of the king (11th June, 1234)--
Tradens ei virgam marescalcie curie sue sicut moris est et sicut
eam antecessores ejus melius et liberius habuerunt.[613]
It would not be in place here to discuss the growth of the office with
the growth of the administration, just as the constableship developed
in its descent from Miles of Gloucester through the Bohuns. The one
point to keep in mind is that the office of marshal descended from
Gilbert _temp._ Hen. I., to Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk, at whose
death in December (1306), the marshalship, by his own arrangement,
reverted to the king.
It was the king’s intention to bestow it on his young son Thomas
“of Brotherton”; but as he was at the time only six years old, it
was given, ‘during pleasure,’ 3rd September, 1307, to Robert de
Clifford,[614] and, a few months later, to Nicholas de Segrave (12th
March, 1308), also ‘during pleasure.’[615] These appointments are
important for their bearing on a note by Dr. Stubbs that
William le Mareschal had served as marshall at the coronation,
but was superseded in 1308 by Nicholas Segrave, with whom he
went to war in 1311. It was probably his dismissal that offended
Lancaster in 1308; see ‘M. Malmesb.,’ p. 103; and he may be
considered as a strong adherent of the earl (of Lancaster).[616]
It is the case that William Marshall had carried the great gilt spurs
at the coronation of Edward II. (Feb., 1308), but we do not find his
name on the Patent Rolls among the appointments to the “Marshalsea
of England.” He can, therefore, only have been chosen to act at the
coronation, and was doubtless selected, in preference to the temporary
Marshal, as being hereditary Marshal of Ireland. Summoned to Parliament
as a baron in 1309, he became one of the ‘Ordainers’ in 1310.
Robert de Clifford, whom Segrave replaced, was afterwards concerned in
Gaveston’s death (or, at least, pardoned as being so),[617] but was
clearly a strong supporter of the king at the beginning of 1308. And as
appointments and favours were bestowed upon him for two or three years
afterwards, one cannot think that he was out of favour, or that he
can be alluded to in the passage cited by Dr. Stubbs from the Monk of
Malmesbury:
(1309) unde magnates terræ cœperunt hæc pro malo habere et
præcipue comes Lancastriæ, quia unus ex familiaribus suis,
procurante Petro, ejectus erat ab officio suo.[618]
It could not in any case apply, as Dr. Stubbs suggests, to William le
Mareschal. Professor Tout not only dates Segrave’s appointment a year
too late, but goes so far as to say that, against him,--
William Marshal, a peer of Parliament and a collateral
representative of the great Marshal family, claimed the office
as devolving on him by hereditary right.[619]
It is obvious that the only person who could make such a claim was the
disinherited brother of the late earl of Norfolk.
On February 10, 1316, the Marshalship of England became once more an
hereditary office, being bestowed on Thomas ‘de Brotherton,’ then earl
of Norfolk, and the heirs male of his body.[620]
Let me here again insist that the fundamental error has been the
anachronism interpolated in Countess Margaret’s coronation claim
(1377). This is really the sole foundation for the statement that the
Clares earls of Pembroke held the office of Marshal of England; and it
can be conclusively shown to arise from mistaking the coronation of
1236 for that of 1154.[621]
Having thus traced to its origin the confusion which made Richard
Strongbow and his father Gilbert marshals of England, I may now deal
with the further confusion which assigns to Richard ‘Strongbow’ a
legitimate son Walter. In Ormerod’s ‘Strigulensia’ (p. 63), in Mr.
Archer’s biography of Richard,[622] and now in the ‘Complete Peerage,’
the fact is accepted as certain. The authority for this statement is a
Tintern Abbey charter, in which William Marshal the younger confirms
certain grants (22nd March, 1223)--
pro animabus bone memorie Walteri filii Ricardi filii Gilberti
Strongbow avi mei, et Willelmi Marescalli patris mei, et
Ysabelle matris mee (‘Mon. Ang.,’ v. 267).
A very able genealogist, Mr. G. W. Watson, holds that this charter
makes the existence of a son Walter “certain.”[623] But as the text
appeared to me obviously corrupt, I referred to the Arundel MS.,[624]
from which it is printed in the ‘Monasticon.’ I there made the
startling discovery that, as I thought possible, the true text is this
(in a 15th century transcript of a 14th century _inspeximus_ of the
13th century charter):
pro animabus bone memorie Walteri filii _Ricardi_, _Gilberti
Strongbowe_, Ricardi filii Gilberti Strongbowe avi mei, et
Willelmi Marescalli patris mei et Ysabelle matris mee[625] (fo.
1).
This makes perfect sense, giving as it does the descent of the Honour
from Walter Fitz Richard (de Clare), founder of Tintern. But a much
later hand (? 17th century) has coolly run a pen through the three
words I have italicised, thus making nonsense of the passage, which was
then, in this mutilated form, printed by Dugdale! It is but a further
instance of the havoc which he and others have wrought in the genealogy
of the famous house of Clare.
As this charter is of independent value for its early (apparently
earliest)[626] mention of the name ‘Strongbow,’ its date is of
importance; Mr. Archer states that it is “dated Strigul, 22nd March,
1206,”[627] an obviously impossible date. Its real date was 22nd March,
1223[628] (7 Hen. III.).
We may now return to the office of Marshal in the 14th century. On June
3, 1317, the king called on the barons of the Exchequer to inform him
from their records, “quæ et cujusmodi feoda marescalli Angliæ qui pro
tempore fuerunt et eorum ministri temporibus progenitorum nostrorum
videlicet de pane, vino, cereolis, et candelis percipere et habere
consueverunt.” For reply they sent him the relative extract from the
“Constitutio domus regis.”[629] In 4 Edward III., “Thomas counte
Norfolk et marshall d’Engleterre” petitioned the king for his fees “qui
appendent a son office de la marechausie dedeinz l’ostell et dehors
auxi, come ses predecesseurs countes mareschauls ount estre servy”;
and he annexed a list of them based on the above return.[630] Again,
on April 13, 1344, the king called on the Exchequer for a return from
its records “de feodis quam de aliis quibuscunque quæ pertinent ad
officium comitis marescalli et mariscalciæ Angliæ,” etc., etc. Again
they sent him the relative extract “in quadam constitutione de domo
regis antiquitus facta”; but they added the passage “in Rubro Libro
Scaccarii” on Queen Eleanor’s coronation (1236), and a ‘Dialogus’
passage on the fees due to the Marshal from those he imprisoned for
default at the Exchequer.[631]
Lastly, we have in the treatise on the Marshal’s office, as given in
Nero D. vi., the following passage at its close (fol. 86_d_):
In rubro libro de scaccario Regis folio xxx^o sic continetur de
marescallo.
Et preter hoc debet magister marescalcie habere dicas de donis
et liberacionibus que fuerint de Thesauro Regis et de sua
camera et debet habere dicas contra omnes officiales Regis ut
testis per omnia. Quatuor marescalli qui serviunt familie Regis
tam clericis quam militibus quam ministris die qua faciunt
herbergeriam vel extra curiam in negocio Regis morantibus, viij
d. in die et galonem vini expens’ et xij frustra candelarum si
extra tres de die in diem homini suo et cand’ plenar’ quod si
aliquis marescallorum missus fuerit in negocio Regis viij d.
ta[ntu]m servientes Marescallorum si fuerint missi in negocio
Regis unusquisque in die iij d. sin autem in domo Regis comedent.
* * * * *
De officio marescalcie servivit Gilbertus comes de Stroghull
cuius est officium tumultus sedare in domo Regis, liberaciones
officiorum[632] facere, hostia aule Regis custodire. Recipit
autem de quolibet Barone facto milite a Rege et quolibet comite
palefridum cum sella.
It is this last extract, as I explained above, which is reproduced in
Norman-French in Countess Margaret’s petition, with the interpolation
of the words which have caused all the confusion.
And here it is necessary to observe that the interesting reference
it contains to the knighting of a ‘Baron’ by the king is reduced to
what Mr. Freeman would have termed “hideous nonsense” in the official
edition of the ‘Red Book of the Exchequer.’ We there read:
Recepit autem de quolibet arma, facto milite a Rege, et [de]
quolibet comite ea die palefridum cum sella (p. 759).
In the ‘Red Book’ itself, indeed, the text is now illegible, but Mr.
Hall tells us that he used the Hargrave MS. for “restoring certain
defaced or missing passages” (p. li.). Now in the Hargrave MS. (fo.
132[633]) the reading is “as clear as a pikestaff”; it could not be
clearer if it were printed. And it is the same reading as we find in
the above extracts:
Recipit autem de quol[ibet] _Barone_ facto milite a rege et
quol[ibet] com[ite] ea die, etc.
Yet Mr. Hall reads: “de quolibet _arma_, facto.” Really, when one
knows that he has undertaken to teach how mediæval MSS. should be
edited,[634] one is driven again reluctantly to ask whether such
editing as this should be styled a farce or a burlesque.[635]
Before returning to the ‘Modus,’ the point from which we started, we
must clear up the confusion that surrounds the title of Earl Marshal.
Camden, apparently, was led by the error in the claim of 1377 to assign
the treatise on the office of Marshal to the time of Henry II.[636]
Coke went further, and, as M. Bémont says, confused the ‘Modus’ with
the treatise. It is the close connexion between the two that leads up
to my theory.[637]
There is a transcript in Nero D. vi., with a beautifully illuminated
initial, of the patent by which Richard II. created Thomas Mowbray earl
of Nottingham Marshal of England and Earl Marshal (12th Jan., 1386),
in tail male. Here again the confusion has been terrible. The Record
Commission’s Catalogue of the Cottonian MSS. describes it as “Literæ R.
Ricardi II. constituentes Tho. _de Brotherton_, com. Nottingham,[638]
Marescallum Angliæ A^o. 1386,” and it is this doubtless, which has
led several writers into grave error, down to M. Bémont, who enters
the document as “les lettres patentes de Richard II. instituant Thomas
de Brotherton maréchal d’Angleterre” (p. 472). But, for my purpose,
the important point is that this is the first grant of the office of
“_Earl_ Marshal.” On the one hand, a high authority asserts in the
‘Dictionary of National Biography’ that Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk,
received “the office of Earl Marshal” in 1246; on the other, we read
in the ‘Complete Peerage’ that an “_Earl_ Marshal” was first created
in 1397.[639] Neither statement is correct. On June 30, 1385, Richard
bestowed on the earl of Nottingham “the office of Marshal of England,”
which we have traced above.[640] Dugdale, citing the record below,
wrongly states that Thomas was “constituted _Earl_ Marshal of England”
for life on this occasion, and is followed in this by Professor
Tout.[641] Thomas certainly styled himself “Earl Marshal and of
Nottingham” in the month following, but this was one of the assumptions
of the time. He was only so created by the patent which follows. It is
desirable, therefore, to give here the exact wording of the grant:
Sciatis quod cum nos nuper de gracia nostra speciali
concesserimus dilecto consanguineo nostro Thome comiti
Notyngh’ officium marescalli Anglie ad totam vitam suam, Nos
jam de uberiori gratia nostra concessimus prefato consanguineo
nostro officium predictum una cum nomine et honore comitis
Marescalli habend’ sibi et heredibus suis masculis de corpore
suo exeuntibus cum omnimodis feodis proficuis et pertinenciis
quibuscunque dicto officio qualitercunque spectantibus.
This grant, which is dated at Westminster, 12th January, 1386 (9 Ric.
II.), is, oddly enough, unknown even to experts. Dugdale had missed it,
and it is consequently ignored in Wallon’s ‘Richard II.,’ in Professor
Tout’s biography of Nottingham,[642] and in the ‘Complete Peerage.’
It illustrates not only the high favour in which Nottingham still
stood, but the _entourage_ of the king at the time, which included
several of those about to lead the opposition.[643]
The above grant is duly referred to in the so-called creation of
February 10, 1397. This is headed in the Rolls of Parliament:
Une chartre du Roy faite a le Conte Mareschall touchant son
Office de Mareschall d’Engleterre....
Sciatis quod cum nuper per literas nostras patentes de gratia
nostra speciali concesserimus dilecto consanguineo nostro Thome
Comiti Notyngh’ Officium Marescalli Anglie, una cum nomine et
honore Comitis Marescalli, habendum sibi et heredibus suis
masculis, etc.... Nos.... volentes proinde pro statu et honore
ipsius Comitis uberius providere, de gratia nostra speciali, in
presenti Parliamento nostro concessimus pro Nobis et heredibus
nostris eidem Comiti dictum officium ac nomen, titulum, et
honorem Comitis Marescalli Anglie habendum sibi et heredibus
suis masculis, etc. (Then follow additional concessions.)
The transition, in the marshal’s style, is interesting enough. First we
have “the Marshal,” or rather “the Master Marshal”; then “the Marshal
of England,” as a more high-sounding style; next a confusion due to the
fact that the Marshals also held an earldom through the 13th century,
and so became, in common parlance (though not in strictness), “Earls
Marshall”; lastly, even so early, we have seen,[644] as 1344, there
occurs the cumbrous and unmeaning phrase “officium comitis marescalli
et mariscalciæ Angliæ.” Proving, though it does, the rapid accretion
of error and confusion in the Middle Ages, the double style obtained
recognition in the Patent of 1386.[645] It is singular that, even
at the present day, the “Peerages” style the duke of Norfolk “Earl
Marshal and hereditary marshal of England,” although he is simply “Earl
Marshal” under the creation of 1672.[646]
An apology is hardly needed for introducing here a characteristic
challenge, addressed by the young Earl Marshal in the chivalrous spirit
of the time, “a noble et honnore S^r le conte de Soissons sire de
Coucy.” This quaint epistle begins thus:
Honure S^r Pour ce que vous estez homme donneur approue de
vaillance et de chevalerie et de grant renomee comme bien est
cogneu es plusieurs lieux honnorables, et je suis joesne,
etc.... Je envoie devers vous Notynghant mon heraut, etc.
Then follow the terms of the challenge:
et apres les trois cops de lance, trois pointes despee, trois
pointes de dague, et trois cops de hache a pie.
Every precaution would seem to be taken against the survival of either
combatant. The letter closes with due formality:
Escript a Londres le x^o jour de Janvier lan de grace mille ccc
iiii^{x(x)} et neuf selon le compte de leglise d’Angleterre.
* * * * *
Par le conte Mareschall’ et de Notyngham S^r de Moubray et de
Segrave mareschall’ d’Angleterre.
This document, I believe, has not hitherto been known.
* * * * *
And now, when we turn to the ‘Modus,’ we find in the chapter treating
“De Casibus et Judiciis difficilibus” a startling statement that, if
difficulties arose,--
tunc comes senescallus, comes constabularius, _comes
marescallus_, vel duo eorum, eligent viginti quinque personas de
omnibus paribus regni, etc., etc.
It need scarcely be said that no such right belonged _ex officio_ to
these three magnates, or was even claimed by them. Yet no one has
suggested, so far as I know, that there must have been a reason for
inserting this clause, and that in such reason we may find a note
of time. Ordainers were elected, under Edward II., in 1310, and a
Commission under Richard II. in 1386. No one, it is certain, could have
introduced the reference to an “Earl Marshal” in 1310, for Thomas,
future marshal of England; was then only a boy of ten. But in 1386
there was, in Nottingham, an Earl Marshal, and one who was, at the
time, taking a leading part. Indeed the three chiefs of the opposition
at the time were Gloucester, Derby, and Nottingham, who respectively
represented the Constable, the Steward,[647] and the Marshal. Add to
this that it was in the Parliament of 1386 that we find the precedent
of Edward II. prominent in the minds of men,[648] and that it was also
in this Parliament that appeal was made to a supposed statute, and that
the ‘Modus’ contains a chapter “De Absentia regis in Parliamento” (a
grievance in 1386), and we have at least a fair presumption that the
‘Modus’--at any rate in the form that has reached us--dates from the
constitutional crisis of 1386.[649]
I shall now close this article, which has already exceeded its original
limits, with a document hitherto unknown, I believe, to English
historians. The Rolls of Parliament preserve, in the proceedings of
1397 against Gloucester, the appeal of treason presented to the king by
the nobles of his party at Nottingham (5th Aug., 1395). But that appeal
is not known to us at first hand. I believe that I have found the terms
of the document, which correspond, it will be seen, with the printed
version. But instead of closing with the words “soit enterment quasse
et adnulle,” as in the Rolls of Parliament (iii. 341), it proceeds:
laquelle bille nous le prouuerons pour vray avec laide de Dieu
et de sa benoiste mere tant comme la vie nous dure.
Then follows, in parallel columns, the interesting portion of the
document, namely, the five articles of accusation, which are, it
will be found, largely different and much shorter than on the Rolls.
Opposite them is a notable confession which, from evidence it contains,
I assign to the duke of Gloucester.
P[re]mierement comment ilz Beauz seignors je vous prie a
voloient auoir depose mons^{r}. tous mercy et vous prie que
vous veulliez dire a Monsr le
Item. Ilz le constraindirent Roy que il pregne garde de mon
a leur donner pouoir par letres filz, quar sil nest chastie
a lencontre de sa regalie et tant quil est jeune, il me
les libertes de sa couronne. resembleira, et je fiz faussete
et traison a mons^r mon pere,
Item. Ils le voloient auoir et ai pense et eusse mis a
prins par force hors de son execution contre mons^r le Roy
chastel et lauoir amene tout contre mon neveu de Rottheland
partout ou ilz voloient et et mon cousin le mareschal et
prins son grant seel deuers plus^s autres(;) dedens xv jours
eulz. ilz eussent este mors et madame
la este mors et madame la Royne
Item. Le vouloient auoir envoiee arriere en France, et
assailli dedens sa tour de fait du royaulme ce que nous
Londres lui estant dedens a eussions voulu. Et avions
sa festedu Noel. ordonne de rendre tous les
hommages a ceulx qui eussent
Item. Depuis ont ilz persevere este de nostre part. Si preng
en leur traison et tant quilz en grace ce que Mons^r me fera
ont ymagine et ordene dauoir quar jai bien desire la mort.
destruit et mis a mort ceulx qui
furent entour la personne de
Mons^{r}.
From internal evidence this confession must (if genuine) proceed from
an uncle of the king, who can only be the duke of Gloucester. I believe
him to have sent it from his prison at Calais, after his arrest and
deportation thither by the “Earl Marshal of England.”
Such documents as this still lurk here and there in MS. Their discovery
rewards, at rare intervals, the toil of original research, as in
those I have printed above bearing on the Commune of London. To this
research, as Dr. Stubbs has urged, historians have now to look;[650]
but for it, in England, at the present time, there is neither
inducement nor reward.[651]
NOTE
On page 21 I speak of Mr. Andrew Lang “tracing the occurrence in
scattered counties of the same clan name to the existence of exogamy
among our forefathers.” This view, which (as I there state) was adopted
by Mr. Grant Allen, is set forth in his notes to Aristotle’s ‘Politics’
(Ed. Bolland, 1877), pp. 96, 99, 101. To show that I have in no way
misrepresented that view, I append these extracts:
the _sibsceaft_, or kinship, which, when settled within its
own mark of land, is known in early Teutonic history as the
_Markgenossenschaft_. Whether in Greece, Rome, or England,
not to mention other countries, the members of each of these
kinships all bore the same patronymic name, etc., etc.
Take the case of early England, one finds the traces of the
clan of Billingas in Northampton, Lancashire, Durham, Lincoln,
Yorkshire, Sussex, Salop, and other widely-separated districts
(Kemble).
The members of these clans bear each the clan patronymic,
perform the same superstitious rites, and are bound to mutual
defence ... in England a man of the Billinga clan, or of the
Arlinga clan, might be a Somersæta, or a Huicca, or a Lindisfara
by local tribe. This curious scattering of the _family_ names
through the _local_ settlements in England has puzzled Mr.
Kemble, who accounts for it by the confusion of the English
invasion, and by later wandering and colonisations. But if the
Arlingas, Billingas, and so forth, were once scattered over
North Germany, as the men of the Sun or Tortoise clans are
scattered all over America and Australia, it would necessarily
happen that when a Jutland tribe invaded the south of England,
it would leave families settled there of the same name as a
Schleswig tribe would leave in the north or west of England.
Mr. Lang then goes on to urge the probability that, as in Australia,
this phenomenon had its origin in exogamy. But I question, in my paper
on the subject, the ‘clan’ phenomenon itself. Mr. Lang, like others,
wrote under the influence of Kemble; and it is the very object of
my paper to show the danger of building theories on Kemble’s rash
conclusions.
Index
A
_Abattis_, meaning of, 47.
Adrian IV., his alleged donation of Ireland, 171–175, 177–179,
199, 200.
----, his “bull Laudabiliter,” 171 _et seq._
Ailwin (Æthelwine) son of Leofstan, 105, 118.
Albemarle, William earl of, 287.
----, ----, Cecily wife of, 287.
Albert of Lotharingia, “clerk,” 36–38.
Albineio, William de, 152.
Aldermannebury, Simon de, 254.
Aldermen, _see_ London.
Alenzun, Matthew de, 254.
Alexander III., his alleged confirmation of “Laudabiliter,” 172,
176, 180, 182, 184, 185, 189, 193, 198.
----, his ‘Black Book’ letters to Henry II., 172, 173, 174, 175,
185–190, 191–194, 196–199.
Allen, Mr. Grant, 5, 16, 22, 23, 25, 321.
Amiens, _échevins_ of, 235.
Andrew of London, 110, 111.
Andrews, Dr., 19.
Anschetil, 121.
Archer, Mr. T. A., opposed to Mr. Oman, 43, 48, 50, 51.
----, ----, on Strongbow, 309–310.
Archers, English, in 14th century, 296, 297, 299, 300.
Archers in Ireland, use of, 157, 160.
Armies, English, in 14th century, 262 _et seq._
Array, Commissions of, 295, 296.
Arthur, succession of, 216, 218.
Arundel, William (1st) earl of, 126–127, 132–134.
----, Honour of, 130–131, 132–134.
Ashdown, battle of, 40.
Assize in Normandy, 250.
Assize of Northampton, 233.
B
Bain, Mr. Joseph, 292, 293, 294.
Balnai, Adam de, 99.
Bannockburn, battle of, 289 _et seq._
Barbour’s Brus, 290–291.
Barons, feudal, in Ireland, 160, 162.
Barons, greater, _see_ London.
Basset, Richard, 121.
Beaumont (Normandy), Holy Trinity of, 116.
Becket, _see_ Beket.
Beket, Gilbert, 101, 102, 247.
----, Thomas, 114, 122, 154, 248.
Belet, Michael, 87.
Bémont, M., 302, 303, 305, 313, 314, 318.
Benefices, Inquest (1212) on ecclesiastical, 267.
Berkeley, _carta_ of Roger de, 59–60.
Bigot, Hugh le, 99.
Bigod, Roger, 152.
Bigod, Roger, 305, 306, 314.
Bishops Stortford castle, 120.
‘Blanch ferm’ in Domesday, 65, 66.
‘Blanch’ money, _see_ Exchequer.
Blemund, Blemunt, William, 107, 108.
Bloomsbury, origin of its name, 108.
Blund, Geoffrey, 253.
----, Robert, 234.
----, Stephen, 254.
Bond, Mr. Thomas, 135.
Bosham, deanery of, 116.
Bosham, _firma_ of, 91.
Boulogne, Count Eustace of, 28, 109, 110, 115, 120.
----, Faramus of, 120, 281.
----, William of, 120.
----, Inquest on Honour of, 270.
Bradwell, Essex, 270.
Braose, William de, 152, 253.
Bray, Thomas, 147–149.
Brewer, Prof., errors of, 146–149.
Brito, Meinfininus, 121, 123.
Bruce, _see_ Bannockburn.
Bucherel, Andrew, 264; _see also_ Bukerel.
Buchuinte, Bucquinte, Bucca Uncta, Andrew, 98, 110–113, 121, 124.
----, ----, justiciar of London, 99, 108.
----, ----, Ralf son of, 101, 108.
----, John, 101, 111, 112, 234.
----, Laurence, 101.
Bucuinte, Geoffrey, 254.
Bukerel, Richard, 120.
----, Stephen, 101, 120.
Bukerel family, 110, 121; _see also_ Bucherel.
_Burh_, the Old English, _see_ Clark.
Burke, Father, 194.
Burrows, Prof. Montagu, 279.
C
Caen, a London family derived from, 106–107.
Calais, Gloucester imprisoned at, 320.
Cambridge, Longchamp at, 214.
Cambridgeshire, sheriff of, 122.
Camden on the marshalship, 305, 313.
Camville, Gerard de, 217.
Canterbury, Stephen archbishop of, 267.
Carew, Sir George, error of, 146, 149.
_Cartæ Antiquæ_, origin of, 88.
Cashel, council of, 183, 187, 188, 191, 192, 193, 194.
“Castlemanni” of Durham, the, 288.
Castle-mounds, 52–54.
Castle Rising, 130.
Challenge, a chivalrous, 317.
Chamberlains, _see_ Exchequer.
Chapel and the township, the, 10–11.
Charters of William I., 28–37; _see also_ Henry II., John.
Chertsey, William abbot of, 121.
Chester, Hugh bishop of, 253, 254.
Chichester, Hilary bishop of, 115, 117.
Chivalry, _see_ Challenge.
Christchurch, _see_ Twynham _and_ London (Holy Trinity).
Churches, _see_ Benefices.
Cinque Ports, institutions of, 244, 245.
Clan-names in England, alleged, 16 _et seq._, 321, 322.
Clare, Walter son of Richard de, 310; _see also_ Pembroke.
Clark, Mr. G. T., on castles, 52–53, 56, 82, 279.
Clement III., death of, 210–213.
Clifford, Robert de, marshal, 306, 307.
Cnihtengild, the English, _see_ London.
Cœlestine II., 212–213.
Cogan, Richard de, 145.
Coinage, new (1180), 86, 88–89.
Coke’s Institutes, 302, 304, 313.
Commune, the sworn, 223, 224.
----, ----, in London, 224 _et seq._
----, ----, in Normandy, 244 _et seq._
_Constabularii, Honor_, 280–281.
Cornage, 282–288.
Constantine, donation of, 178, 189, 195, 197.
_Constitutio domus regis_, the, 82, 310, 311.
Coote, Mr., 103, 105, 226, 227, 228.
Cordel, Hugh, 120.
Cornhill, Gervase of, 107, 111, 112, 117, 120.
----, Henry of, 107, 111, 253, 254, 256.
----, Reginald of, 256.
Cornwall, Crown rents in, 71.
Coronation, of Matilda wife of William I., 35.
---- of Henry II., 303, 304.
---- of Richard I., 201–206.
---- of Eleanor wife of Henry III., 203–206, 303, 304, 311.
----, of Richard II., 302.
Coronation services (“officia”), 203–206, 303.
Coroner, serjeanty of being, 270.
Coucy, the (count of Soissons) sire de, 316.
Coupland, Noutegeld of, 287.
Courci, John de, 143.
----, ----, book of his ‘Gestes,’ 149.
----, ----, conquers Ulster, 161–163.
----, ----, origin of, 162.
Courci, Jordan de, 162.
Courcy, Robert de, 99.
Courtenay, Reginald de, 152.
Coutances, Algar bishop of, 99.
Cows paid for cornage, 287.
Crecy, battle of, 45, 299–301.
Cressy, Hugh de, 152.
Cricklade, Wilts, 83.
Cumberland, cornage tenants of, 283–285.
----, Noutegeld in, 287.
_Curia regis_ in Treasury, the, 94.
----, at Westminster, 111.
D
Danegeld, _see_ Middlesex; Towns.
Dean, miners from forest of, 294.
Deaneries of houses of secular canons, 115–116.
_Den_, the forest, 20.
Derman of London, 106; _see also_ Thierri.
Dermot, king, 142–144, 158–159, 169, 179–180.
Devon, early _firma_ from, 73.
----, stereotyped rents in, 70.
_Dialogus de Scaccario_, authority of, 64 _et seq._
----, cited, 311.
Dimock, Mr. J. F., 141, 146–148, 182, 183, 192.
Diplomatic, a point of, 30–36.
Disseisin, formula of Novel, 114, 127.
Domesday, appeal to, 94.
---- compared with the Inquest of 1212, 265–266, 274.
----, finance in, 65–67, 68–73.
----, place-names in, 24.
----, record of assessment in, 57.
----, tenants variously described, 37–38.
Dorchester, Wulfwig bishop of, 29.
Dover castle, constableship of, 278–282.
----, wards and towers of, 279.
Dover, Foubert de, 279.
Duket, Nicholas, 234.
Durham, cornage in palatinate of, 287, 288.
----, troops from, 294.
E
Eadwine, alderman of London, 112.
Earle, Prof., 15, 19, 23, 27.
Edward the Confessor, 28, 36, 38, 98, 99.
Edward II.; _see_ Bannockburn.
Edward II., deposition of, 318.
Eleanor, queen, wife of Henry II., 236, 250.
Ely, Geoffrey, bishop of, 87.
Ely, Walter de, 254.
Enfeoffment, _see_ _Vetus_.
Essex, Henry de, Constable, 281.
Essex, Maurice (of Tiltey), sheriff of, 109, 118.
Essex, place-names of, 2 _et seq._
Eustace, nephew of Fulchred, 101, 124.
Eustace, the sheriff, 38.
Exchequer, chamberlains of the, 77, 81–85, 95.
----, at Westminster, 79–81.
----, watchman of the, 80.
----, a development of the Treasury, 80–84, 93–95.
----, enrolment at, 89.
----, records of the, 202–204; _see also_ Sheriffs.
----, tallies of, 63, 74–75.
----, pleas held at the, 64, 86, 89.
----, its chequered table, 64, 74, 94.
----, standards of account at, 65–66, 70, 85–87, 89–93.
Exchequer, changes in system of, 66–69, 72–75, 94.
----, antiquity of assay at, 66, 69.
----, its ‘combustion’ tally, 75.
----, barons of, 62, 85, 86, 89.
Exeter, endowment from ferm of, 85–87.
----, foreign merchants at, 245.
Exogamy, alleged traces of, 21, 321–322.
Eyton, Mr., 24, 60, 79, 133, 134, 151, 152.
F
Fafiton, Robert, 258.
Falkirk, battle of, 298.
Fantosme, Jordan, 232.
Feipo, Futepoi, Totipon, Adam de, 142.
Fergant, Bartholomew, 248–9.
Ferm, _see_ _Firma_.
Fiennes family alleged constables of Dover, 279–281.
_Firma comitatus_, the, origin of, 72–73, 230.
_Firma unius noctis_, the, 70–72.
Fitz Alan, William, barony of, 128.
Fitz Audelin, William, 151, 152, 161, 182–183, 190.
Fitz Count, Brian, 76, 78.
Fitz Gerald, Maurice, 156.
Fitz Gerold, Warin, (I.) chamberlain, 83, 101.
----, ----, (II.) chamberlain, 84.
Fitz Osbern, earl William, 29, 30.
Fitz Reinfred, Roger, 87.
Fitz Stephen, Robert, 153.
Fitz Urse becomes MacMahon, 162.
Fitz Walter, Peter, 229, 231, 253.
Fitz Walter, Robert, 253.
Five-knight unit, the, 56, 155.
Fleming, Richard le, 142, 155.
Freeman, Prof., 29–32, 34, 36, 38, 40–46, 49, 52, 137, 155, 289,
292, 312.
Fulcher, 116.
Fulcoin, Fulkoin, Fulquin, Fulcoi, the sheriff, 121–123.
Fulk son of Ralf, 120.
_Furnellis_, Alan de, 87.
----, G. de, 88.
Futepoi, _see_ Feipo.
G
Gasquet, Father, 173, 174, 176, 177, 178, 181, 193, 196, 200.
George, Mr. Hereford, 45.
Gerpunvilla, William de, 152.
Gervase son of Agnes, 101.
Gilbert the Sheriff (founder of Merton Priory), 121–123.
Gilbert son of Reinfred, 268.
Gilds, endowments by, 104–105.
Giraldus Cambrensis, 143, 144, 145, 157, 159, 160, 164–167, 172,
178–188, 190–198.
----, early translations of, 147–149.
Giry, M., 237, 239, 244, 247–252.
Glanville, Ranulf de, 87.
Gloucester, Milo de, 121, 123, 306.
Gloucester, Robert earl of, 76, 78.
Gloucester, Thomas duke of, 315, 318;
his arrest and confession, 319–320.
Glove as gage, the, 153.
Green, Mr. J. R., 5, 16, 289.
Gross, Dr., 228, 237.
Guest, Dr., 5, 6.
Gundeville, Hugh de, 152.
H
Hacon the dean, 101, 106.
_Haga_ not _villa_, 15.
Hall, Mr. Hubert, on the Treasury and Exchequer, 62, 67–68, 74–75,
79–80, 84, 85.
----, on the Inquest of Sheriffs, 125 _et seq._
----, on the coronation of Richard I., 205–6.
----, on the Red Book Inquisitions, 262–273, 275.
----, on castle-ward, 278, 282, 286.
----, on Dover Castle, 279–280.
----, on cornage, 282–286.
----, misreads his MSS., 312–313.
_Ham_, the suffix, 2 _et seq._
Hampshire, _Firma unius noctis_ in, 71–72.
Hartshorne, Mr., 56.
Hastings, battle of, 40–52, 301.
Haverhell, Brichtmer de, 229.
----, William de, 233.
Haya, Ralf de, 152.
Heir, making an, 111.
Helion, Tehel de, 38.
Henry II. and London, 222, 223, 228, 232–233, 256.
----, and Ireland, _see_ Ireland.
Henry II., his charters before his accession, 82.
Henry son of Henry II., 251.
Henry son of Ailwin (Æthelwine), first mayor of London, 105, 225,
253.
Hereford, earldom of, 30.
Highworth, Wilts, 83.
Hinde, Mr. Hodgson, 284, 285.
Holand, Thomas de, earl of Kent, marshal, 314.
Household, the king’s, _see_ _Constitutio_.
Hoveden, Roger, 184, 188, 197, 201, 205, 208–209, 213, 215, 216,
217.
Howlett, Mr., 208.
Howorth, Sir Henry, 289.
Howth, the Book of, 146–149, 162, 163.
----, interpolations in, 148–149.
----, share of Christopher lord of Howth in, 149.
Hubert ‘juvenis,’ 110, 114.
Hugh, son of Wulfgar, 101, 102, 118, 120–121.
Huitdeniers or Octodenarii, Osbert, justiciar of London, 113–114,
116, 121.
Humfraville, Ida de, 254.
----, Richard de, 254.
Hundred and the township, the, 12.
Hundreds, Inquest of 1212 taken by, 265–266, 275.
Hunt, Rev. W., 208.
Huntingdon, Austin priory at, 122.
Hunts, sheriffs of, 121–123.
I
_Ing_, the suffix, 3 _et seq._
Ingelric the priest, 28–30, 36, 115.
_Ingham_, the suffix, 15–16.
Innocent X., 199–200.
Inquest of 1212, the great, 261 _et seq._
Inquest of Sheriffs, _see_ Sheriffs.
Inquest, sworn, in London, 98–100.
----, of 1212, 268, 273, 274.
Insula, Robert de, 286.
Interdict under John, 267.
Ipra (Ypres), William de, 100.
Ireland, the Conquest of, 137 _et seq._
Ireland, its golden age, 137–140, 165, 166, 169.
----, Scandinavian settlers in, 140, 144.
----, Norman invaders of, 140, 156 _et seq._
----, feudal settlement of, 143, 155, 159, 160.
----, poem on conquest of, 141 _et seq._
----, Henry II. in, 150–152, 189, 192–194, 199–200.
----, internecine conflict in, 159.
----, policy of see-saw in, 163–164.
----, failure of its conquest, 164, 167.
----, corruption of church in, 165–166, 175.
----, publication of ‘Laudabiliter’ in, 181, 192, 194.
----, Henry II. recognised as king in, 184–185, 187; _see also_
Howth; ‘Laudabiliter.’
Ireland, scutage of, 129, 131, 134.
Irish, tendencies of, 138–139, 164–165, 168–170.
----, mode of warfare of, 156–158.
----, their character impugned, 174, 175, 183–187, 197, 199, 200.
Islington, Newington Barrow in, 106.
Italian citizens of London, 110.
J
Jews, debts to, 130.
John, exactions of, 274.
----, the great Inquest (1212) under, 262.
----, in Ireland, 165.
----, his struggle with Longchamp, 207–218.
John, takes the oath to the Commune, 224.
----, claims to succeed Richard, 215–218.
----, confirms ‘liberties’ to London, 235.
----, his charters to London, 256.
John ‘the Mad’ (‘the Wode’), 145.
John son of Ralf son of Everard, 120.
K
Kemble, Mr., 2, 6, 9, 16–26.
Kent, ‘sulungs’ of, 26–27.
Kingsford, Mr., 316.
Kitchin, Dean, 221, 243.
Knight service, tenure by, 56–61; _see also_ Five-knight.
Knights’ fees, numbers of, 289–290.
L
Laci, Hugh de, 142, 155;
Walter de, 150.
Lafaite, John, 113.
Laigle, Richer de, 246, 249.
Lancashire, Inquest of 1212 in, 268–269.
----, troops from, 295.
Lang, Mr. Andrew, 21, 321–322.
‘Laudabiliter,’ the ‘Bull,’ 171 _et seq._
Law, _see_ Assize, _Curia Regis_, Disseisin, Enfeoffment,
Exchequer, Glove, Heir, Inquest, Peace, Pleas, Possession,
Seisin.
Leicestershire, troops from, 294–296.
Leinster, feudal settlement of, 155, 160.
Leofstan the goldsmith, 106.
Leofstan son of Orgar, 105.
l’Estrange, Guy, 128.
----, John, 128.
_Liber Rubeus_, _see_ Red Book.
Liebermann, Prof., 144–145.
Lincoln Castle, 208–209, 211, 214, 217, 218.
Lincolnshire, Inquest of 1212 in, 275.
----, troops from, 294, 296.
Lisieux, Arnulf bishop of, _see_ Sées.
----, Hugh bishop of, 35.
Lismore, Christian (papal legate) bishop of, 183, 186.
Llandaff, Ralf, archdeacon of, 187.
Loftie, Mr., 99, 103–105, 221, 226, 228, 239, 240.
London, aldermen of, 219, 237–9.
----, aldermen of, officers of the wards, 241–243, 255.
----, Aldersgate, 110, 114.
----, greater barons of, 252–253.
----, Blacstan’s ward in, 112.
----, Bloomsbury, 108.
----, Bucklersbury, 121.
----, charter of Henry I. to, 229, 233, 235.
----, charters of, their custody, 256.
----, citizens of, 119, 233–235.
----, Commune of, 219 _et seq._
----, ‘daibelle’ in, 256.
----, _donum_ or _auxilium_ of, 257.
----, Dowgate, 246.
----, Eadwine an alderman of, 112.
----, Edmund an alderman (1137) of, 101.
----, its election of Stephen, 97.
----, the English Cnihtengild of, 102–106, 221.
----, exchequer at, _see_ Westminster.
----, folkmoot of, 221.
----, foreign influence in, 222, 245–247.
----, Fulcred chamberlain of, 121, 124.
----, hanging of a citizen in, 113.
----, Husting of, 111, 221, 222, 242, 256.
----, sworn inquest in, 99–100.
----, justiciars of, 98, 99, 108, 109, 113, 116–118.
----, ‘liberties’ of, 234–236.
----, its loyalty to Henry II., 232.
----, mayor of, 238–243.
----, mayor and échevins of, 235–237.
----, mediæval history, importance of it, 220.
----, origin of its mayoralty, 219, 223, 225, 226, 235, 244.
----, St. Lawrence Jewry, 253, 254.
----, St. Mary, Aldermanbury, 253, 255.
----, St. Paul’s churchyard, 224.
----, scavage of, 256–257.
----, scavengers (‘escavingores’) of, 255.
----, shrievalty of, 221–222, 229–235, 255.
----, soke of the Cnihtengild, 99, 101.
----, schools of, 117.
----, ----, Henry, master of, 117.
----, tower of, 99, 101, 118, 253, 254, 319.
----, Holy Trinity priory, its endowment at Exeter, 85–87.
----, ----, Norman prior of, 99, 104.
----, ----, Stephen prior of, 86.
----, ----, charters of, 88, 97, 103.
----, ----, endowed by the Cnihtengild, 98, 102, 104, 108.
----, ----, a citizen canon of, 107.
----, “twenty-four” (councillors) of the, 237–243.
----, a verdict of the city of, 253.
----, vineyard in Smithfield, 99, 100.
----, ward system of, 255.
----, list of wards in, 36, 102.
----, weavers’ gild of, 105.
----, watch and ward in, 254.
----, William archdeacon of, 101, 117, 118.
----, William chamberlain of, 101, 108. _See also_ St. Paul’s;
St. Martin’s; Derman; Islington; Andrew; Henry; Oath.
London, Maurice, bishop of, 116.
----, Robert bishop of, 118, 119; _see also_ Richard.
London and Middlesex, ‘firma’ of, 229–234, 257.
Longchamp, William, a London charter of, 253.
----, his struggle with John, 207–218, 224.
----, legation of, 210, 212–213.
----, Henry brother of William, 253.
----, Daniel clerk of William, 254.
Lorengus, Walter, 253.
Lotharingia, _see_ Albert.
Luard, Dr., 202, 204.
Lubbock, Sir J., 63.
Luci, Richard de, 100, 109, 115, 182.
M
Mackay, Dr. Æneas, 292.
Macmahon, originally Fitz Urse, 162.
Madden, Sir Frederic, 202.
Mærleswegen the sheriff, 29.
Maitland, Prof., 1, 12, 57, 69, 153, 154, 230, 257, 282, 283, 284.
Maldon, charter of Henry II. to, 152.
----, writ relating to, 115.
Malet, William, 29.
Malone, Father, 177, 181, 196.
Mandeville, Geoffrey (I.) de, 72.
----, Geoffrey (II.) de, 73, 99.
----, ----, earl of Essex, 100.
----, ----, charters of, 101, 118–119.
----, ----, Roheis wife of, 102, 118, 119.
----, ----, justiciar of London, 117–118.
Mantel, Robert, 87.
‘Mark’ theory, the, 17, 18, 19, 20.
Marshal, Gilbert the, 306.
----, John the, 306.
----, William le, 307, 308.
Marshal, earl, use of phrase, 311, 313, 316, 317.
----, ----, creation of an, 313–315.
Marshal, fees and duties of the, 310–312, 314–315.
----, development of his office, 316.
Marshal’s office, treatise on, 302.
Marshalship, descent of the, 305–306 _et seq._
Martel, William, 99.
Matilda, Empress, writ of, 116.
----, ----, expelled from London, 222.
Matilda wife of William I., 31, 32, 34, 35.
Mauduit, Robert, 82.
----, William, chamberlain, 81–82.
----, William, Domesday tenant, 82.
Mayor, a, associated with the Commune, 223, 225;
but not essential to it, 228.
Meath, feudal settlement of, 155, 160.
Merton priory, foundation of, 122–123.
Meyer, M. Paul, 150.
Middlesex, ‘Hidagium’ of, 257–260.
----, Danegeld of, 257, 260.
----, Inquest of 1212 in, 264–265, 275.
_Modus tenendi Parliamentum_, 302, 313.
----, date of, 317–318.
Montfort, Hugh de, constable of Dover, 281.
Montfort, Simon de, besieges Rochester castle, 54–55.
Moran, Cardinal, 171, 175, 177, 179, 181, 186, 198.
Morris, Father, 173–177, 181, 194.
Mowbray and Segrave, _see_ Nottingham, Thomas earl of.
N
Naas, barons of the, 156.
Nangle, Gilbert de, 156.
Nantes, Master William de, 254.
Neatgild, _see_ Cornage.
Newcastle, ward service of, 283–284, 286.
Norfolk, Margaret ‘Marshal,’ countess of, 303, 304, 308, 312.
Norgate, Miss, 41, 112, 113, 150, 176, 177–184, 191–196, 201, 208,
211, 213, 246–247.
Normandy, no ‘blanch ferm’ in, 65.
----, exchequer of, under Henry I., 95.
Northumberland, cornage payments in, 282–286, 288.
----, drengs and thegns of, 282.
----, Inquest of 1212 in, 270–271.
----, troops from, 294–295.
Nottingham herald, 317.
Nottingham, Thomas Mowbray, earl of, created Earl Marshal, 313–315,
318, 319–320.
----, his challenge, 317.
Nugent, Gilbert de, 155.
Numbers, Mediæval, exaggeration of, 289–290.
O
Oath of the Commune of London, 235;
of freemen of London, 236;
of ‘twenty-four’ Councillors, 237;
of Common Council of London, 241;
of Aldermen of London, 242.
Octodenarii, _see_ Huitdeniers.
Oger a Domesday tenant, 38.
O’Grady, Mr. Standish, 137–139.
Old feoffment, _see_ _Vetus_.
Oman, Mr. C., and his works, 39–61, 155, 289, 293–301;
_see also_ Archer.
Ordgar the deacon, 106.
Ordgar “le prude,” 98, 100, 106.
Orford, castle at, 128.
Orpen, Mr. G. A., 141, 143, 144, 150, 153, 154, 156.
Oxford, number of students at, 290.
----, seizure of the bishops at, 114.
Oxford, Ralf de, 121.
P
Palisade, dissolving views of the, 43–49.
_Pares_ in municipalities, 240, 243.
Paris, Matthew, 202–206.
Parish and the township, the, 10–12.
Parliament, creation in, 315.
Pavily, Reginald de, 152.
Peace, the king’s, 236, 237.
Peers, early mention of a man’s, 154.
Pembroke, Gilbert de Clare (1st) earl of (? ‘Strongbow’), 305, 309,
310.
----, Gilbert Marshal, earl of, 305, 312.
----, ----, confused with Gilbert de Clare, earl of, 302–305, 308.
----, Richard de Clare, (2nd) earl of (‘Strongbow’), 143, 152, 155,
156, 159, 180, 304, 308, 310.
----, ----, daughter of, 150.
----, ----, alleged son of, 309.
----, Walter Marshal, earl of, 308, 316.
----, William Marshal, earl of, 305, 306.
----, William (II.), Marshal, earl of, 309.
Pembroke, Henry II. at, 151, 152.
Percy, Henry de, marshal, 303.
Peter son of Alan, 106, 107.
Peterborough, Brand, abbot of, 29.
Physicians, 101.
Place-names, plea for classification of, 14.
Pleas in London, 238, 242.
Pont de l’arche, William de, 76, 78.
Porchester castle and the chamberlainship, 82.
Port, Hugh de, 37.
Porter, serjeanty of being castle, 271.
Possession, appeal to, 99.
Powell, Prof. York, 6, 17, 39, 54.
Prendergast, Maurice de, 153, 155, 158, 165.
Puintel, William, 253.
R
Ralf son of Algod, 101, 102.
Ramsay, Sir James, 49, 51, 52, 65, 67, 289.
Ramsey Abbey, endowments of, 104.
Records, value of, 289.
_Red Book of the Exchequer_, correction of errors in, 83, 84, 96,
125 _et seq._, 205, 206, 262 _et seq._, 278–286.
----, alleged loss of transcripts in, 205.
Regan, Maurice, 142, 143–144.
Regenbald, priest and chancellor, 28, 29, 37.
Rents, crown, payable in kind, 68, 69.
Ria, Avelina de, 134.
Richard I., in his father’s lifetime, 250, 251.
----, his coronation, 201–206.
----, objects to a Commune, 223, 228.
----, leaves for the east, 207, 213.
----, his imprisonment in Germany, 235.
----, his ‘redemption,’ 234.
Richard II., troubles under, 315, 317–320.
Richard of Devizes, 208–212, 215, 216, 217, 218, 223, 227–228.
Richard, son of Bishop Nigel, 65 _et seq._
----, treasurer, 87, 201, 204.
Richard son of Osbert, constable, 118.
Richard son of Reiner, 253, 254.
Richard son of William I., 34, 35.
Riddlesford, Walter de, 155.
Riley, Mr., 256, 257.
Rinuccini, his mission to Ireland, 200.
Ripariis, Margaret de, 83.
Robert son of Bernard, 152.
Robert son of Leofstan, 105.
Rochelle, La, Commune of, 248–251.
Rochester castle, 54–56.
Roger, chancellor to Stephen, 99.
Roger mayor of London, 256.
Roger ‘nepos Huberti,’ 107.
Roll, a king’s, 86, 88.
Rouen, Hugh archbishop of, 249.
----, Rotrou archbishop of, 249.
----, Walter (de Coutances) archbishop of, 216, 218, 236.
----, charter of Duke Henry to, 246.
----, charter of Henry II. to, 233, 248, 251.
----, Commune of, 244–251.
----, Établissements de, 239–241, 243, 247–251.
----, Mayor of, 247–249.
----, vicomte of, 232.
----, watch at, 255.
Ruffus, William, 152.
Ruilli, Robert de, 152.
Rumold, 120.
----, Bernard son of, 120, 121.
S
St. Bees, gift to, 287.
St. Martin, Alvred de St., 152.
St. Martin’s-le-Grand, deans of, 28, 109, 110, 114–117.
----, canons of, 109, 110, 114–115, 118.
----, schools of, 117.
St. Paul’s, the canons of, 102.
----, Ralf chancellor of, 101.
----, chantry in, 254.
----, chapter of, 119.
----, restoration to, 119.
St. Quentin, Commune of, 244, 252.
Saintes, Commune of, 250.
Salisbury, Roger bishop of, 66–67, 109, 110, 114–116.
Salisbury, John of, and the alleged grant of Ireland, 172, 177,
179, 189, 198.
_Scalam, ad_, payment, 85–87, 92–93, 95.
Schools, _see_ London.
Scots, _see_ Bannockburn.
Scots, the King of, 286.
Seebohm, Mr., 3, 4, 6, 8, 13, 14, 17, 27.
Sées, Arnulf archdeacon of, 98, 99.
Segrave, Nicholas de, marshal, 307.
Seisin, restoration of, 217.
Selby, Mr. Walford, 125.
Serjeanty, tenure by, 61, 83.
_Servitium debitum_, the, 58–60.
Sevenhampton, Wilts, 83.
Sharpe, Dr., 238.
Sheriff, an attorney of a, 86.
Sheriffs’ aid, 118.
Sheriffs and ‘custodes,’ 229–233, 286.
----, at the Exchequer, 75, 123.
----, and the _firma_, 230–231.
----, under Henry I., 123, 124.
Sheriffs, the inquest of, 125–136.
Shield wall, the English, 39–44, 47, 49, 50, 291, 292.
Skeat, Prof., 256.
Slane, barons of, 142.
Somerset, stereotyped rents in, 71.
----, Ulster families from, 162.
Spatz, Dr., 49, 50.
Standard, battle of the, 41.
Stapleton, Mr., 65, 67, 74, 79.
Stephen, king, 97–100, 109, 110, 114–116.
Stevenson, Mr. W. H., 28–35.
Stotevilla, William de, 154.
Stratton, Adam de, 84.
Stratton, Wilts, 84.
Strogoil, _see_ Pembroke.
Strongbow, _see_ Pembroke.
Stubbs, Dr., 16, 38, 60, 62, 64, 65, 95, 104, 110, 111, 113, 119,
125, 126, 129, 155, 201, 202, 207–211, 213, 215, 220, 224,
225–226, 230, 290, 302, 307, 308, 318, 320.
Surrey, place-names of, 2–3.
----, sheriffs of, 121–123.
Sussex, place-names of, 2 _et seq._
_Swereford_, erroneous ‘dictum’ of, 129.
----, error of, 132.
T
Taylor, Canon Isaac, 7, 9, 17, 19, 21, 25.
_Terræ datæ_ accounted for, 73.
‘Testa de Nevill,’ nature of, 261, 262.
----, returns of great Inquest (1212) in, 262, 277.
----, misdescribed on the title page, 274, 283.
_Testudo_, _see_ Shield wall.
Thegnage, Tenure in, 271.
Thierri, son of Derman, 101, 106, 112.
----, Bertram son of, 106, 107.
Thomas ‘of Brotherton,’ marshal, 303, 308, 311, 313, 314, 317, 318.
Thoms, Mr., 305.
_Ton_, the suffix, 2 _et seq._
Tosard, Avicia, 269.
----, Walter, 269.
Totemism, alleged traces of, 23.
Tout, Prof., 151, 182, 308, 314, 315.
Towcester, the moated mound at, 53, 54.
Towns, assessment of, for Danegeld, 257–258.
Township and the parish, the, 10–12.
Treasurer, Henry the, 76, 81.
----, Richard the, 87.
Treasury, charters kept in the, 88.
----, plea held in the, 94.
Treasury, records in, searched, 318.
Treasury, the, at Winchester, 75–81, 94, 178.
----, audit of, 76–78.
----, the Exchequer a development of, 80–84.
----, in Normandy, 82.
----, chamberlainship of, 82, 84.
Twynham, deanery of, 116.
Tynemouth, prior of, 286, 287.
U
Ulf son of Topi, 29, 30.
Ulkotes, Philip de, 270, 271.
Ulster, conquest of, 161–162.
----, feudal settlement of, 162–163.
V
Valoines, Barony of, 127, 130.
Ver, Aubrey de, 99, 121.
Ver, Robert de, 109, 281.
Verdun, Ralf de, 152.
_Vetus feoffamentum_, meaning of, 58–60.
Vetulus, _see_ Viel.
Viel, or Vetulus John, 107, 112, 113.
Village, community, the, 19.
W
Wace misunderstands William of Malmesbury, 50.
Wales, troops from, 293–295, 300–301.
Walter, Theobald, 269, 270.
Warwickshire, early _firma_ from, 72.
----, troops from, 294–296.
Wassail, 272.
Waterford, Henry II. at, 150, 152.
----, synod at, 180–181.
Watson, Mr. G. W., 304, 309, 310.
Wendover, 280, 282.
Westminster Abbey, its lands in Middlesex, 259–260.
----, its lands in Worcestershire and Glo’stershire, 265.
Westminister, Exchequer at, 79–81.
Westmoreland, cornage of, 286.
Wexford, Henry II. at, 152.
William I., charters of, 28–37.
William the chamberlain, _see_ London.
William of Malmesbury, 50, 224.
William of Newburgh, 208–212, 215, 216.
William, son of Isabel, 233.
Winchester, Henry bishop of, 109, 114–117.
Winchester, conference at, 208, 213, 214.
----, a council at, 123.
----, Inquest of 1212 on, 272.
----, municipality of, 242–243.
----, origin of its corporation, 221.
----, the Treasury at, 75–81.
Windsor, William de, 264.
Worcester, Mauger bishop of, 267.
Worcestershire, early _firma_ from, 73.
----, Inquest of 1212 in, 265, 267.
Wyzo, the goldsmith son of Leofstan, 106.
Y
Yarmouth, Inquest of 1212 on, 274.
York, Ealdred, archbishop of, 29.
Yorkshire, troops from, 294–296.
Butler & Tanner, The Selwood Printing Works, Frome, and London.
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
[Illustration]
Geoffrey de Mandeville
A STUDY OF THE ANARCHY
pp. xii., 461
“For many reasons this is the most remarkable historical work which
has recently appeared ... at once received fitting recognition as the
most accurate and penetrating work that had till then appeared on the
subject.”--_Spectator._
“It is not easy, within the limits of a review, to do justice to
the learning and ability which characterize Mr. Round’s study....
Indeed few books so learned and suggestive have recently been
published.”--_Literary World._
“The work is most skilfully and ably done, and a whole series of
important discoveries is derived from Mr. Round’s efforts.... The
result is a very large addition to our knowledge.... Mr. Round has
carried through an undertaking which raises him to a foremost position
among historical scholars.”--_Athenæum._
“All the vivacity, keenness, freshness, and accuracy that have marked
Mr. Round’s previous writings.”--_Manchester Guardian._
“Fresh life from dry records is what Mr. Round aims at.... He
has permanently associated his name with the scientific study of
Anglo-Norman history.”--Prof. LIEBERMANN in _English Historical Review_.
“M. J. H. Round vient de nous donner une étude des plus pénétrantes et
fécondes ... c’est un véritable modèle, et l’on doit souhaiter pour nos
voisins qu’il fasse école.”--_Revue Historique._
“Almost, if not quite, the most original effort in history during the
last twenty years was a twelfth century biographical study in which the
value, picturesque and human, of charter evidence was illustrated with
unmatched force.”--_Athenæum._
Feudal England
HISTORICAL STUDIES ON THE XIth AND XIIth CENTURIES
pp. xiv., 587
“Every one who has any care for the true, the intimate history of
mediæval England will at once get this book.... It contains some of the
most important contributions that have been made of late years to the
earlier chapters of English history.... The day for the charters has
come, and with the day the man.... His right to speak is established,
and we are listening.”--_Athenæum._
“The whole book leaves the stamp of deep research and of a singularly
unbiassed mind.... Mr. Round has set all intending researchers an
admirable example ... if we ever get a work which is to do for
the early institutions of England what the great Coulanges did
for those of France, we expect it will be from the pen of Mr.
Round.”--_Spectator._
“Not the least of Mr. Round’s merits is that the next generation will
never want to know how much rubbish he has swept or helped to sweep
away. He has done more than any one scholar to put us in the way of
reading Domesday Book aright. He has illustrated by abundant examples
the wisdom and the necessity of ... patient study of our documents, ...
his acute and ever watchful criticism.”--SIR F. POLLOCK in
_English Historical Review_.
“In _Feudal England_ as in _Geoffrey de Mandeville_ he displays
consummate skill in the critical study of records, and uses the
evidence thus obtained to check and supplement the chroniclers.”--DR.
GROSS in _American Historical Review_.
“Plein de faits, d’observations pénétrantes, de conclusions neuves et
de grande portée, ... il a réussi à rétablir la logique où, avant lui,
on ne trouvait que confusion.”--_Revue Historique._
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Speech in the House of Commons (_Times_, 6th June, 1899).
[2] It is important to observe that the Pope’s letter of 20th
September, 1172, contains an unmistakable reference to the (forged)
Donation of Constantine in the words “Romana ecclesia aliud jus habet
in Insula quam in terra magna te continua” (see p. 197 below). Dr.
Zinkeisen, in his paper on “the Donation of Constantine as applied
by the Roman Church,” speaks of this letter as “a genuine bull of
Alexander III.” (‘English Historical Review,’ ix. 629), but strangely
overlooks the allusion, and asserts that he could find no use made by
the Popes of the forged Donation at this period.
[3] See Mr. Scargill-Bird’s ‘Guide to the Public Records.’
[4] ‘Feudal Aids’ (Calendars of State Papers, etc.), vol. i., pp.
ix.-xi.
[5] Director of the Royal Historical Society; Lecturer on Palæography
and Diplomatic at the London School of Economics, etc., etc.
[6] See pp. 131, 135, 283, etc., and Index.
[7] “The surrender of the Isle of Wight” (in ‘Genealogical Magazine,’
vol. i., p. 1) and “The Red Book of the Exchequer” (in ‘Genealogist,’
July, 1897).
[8] January, 1899 (xiv. 150–151). The first paper in my treatise deals
with “the antiquity of scutage,” and contains further evidence for my
contention that, contrary to the accepted view, this important tax
was levied before the days of Henry II. Mr. Hall replied that it was
“curious to find” me seriously citing “forgeries,” the evidence of
which he ridiculed, without deigning to discuss them.
The “most conclusive document” (as I termed it) which I cited in my
favour is a charter of the time of Stephen, which I printed in full
in my treatise (pp. 8–9). Of this I need scarcely say more than that
the authorities of the British Museum have now selected it for special
exhibition among the most interesting of their charters, and have drawn
particular attention to its important mention of scutage (see the
official guide to the MSS., p. 40).
The value of Mr. Hall’s assertions, and the futility of his attempted
reply, could hardly be more effectively exposed. I may add that I
have still a few copies of my treatise available for presentation to
libraries used by scholars.
[9] See Index.
[10] Archæological Review, iv. 235.
[11] Prefixed to the Domesday volume published by the Sussex
Archæological Society.
[12] A generation later than Domesday we find lands at Broadhurst (in
Horsted Keynes) given to Lewes Priory, which “usque ad modernum tempus
silve fuerunt” (Cott. MS. Nero c. iii. fo. 217).
[13] Anglo-Saxon Britain, p. 30.
[14] Ibid. Dr. Guest suggested of Ælle, at the battle of Mercred’s Burn
(485), that “on this occasion he may have met Ambrosius and a national
army; for Huntingdon tells us that the ‘reges et tyranni Brittanum’
were his opponents.” But if the Saxon advance was eastwards, it could
not well have brought them face to face with the main force of the
Britons.
[15] English Village Community, pp. 126, 127, etc.
[16] Social England, i. 122 _et seq._
[17] 2nd ed. p. 178.
[18] English Village Community, pp. 169, 170.
[19] He writes, of _ing_, that “Mr. Kemble had overlooked no less than
47 names in Kent, 38 in Sussex, and 34 in Essex” (ed. 1888, p. 82).
[20] The Lewes Priory Charters afford instances in point.
[21] Archæological Review, iv. 233 _et seq._
[22] One would like to know on what ground the suffix “-well,” familiar
in Essex (Broadwell, Chadwell, Hawkwell, Netteswell, Prittlewell,
Ridgwell, Roxwell, Runwell), but curiously absent in Sussex, is derived
from the Roman ‘villa.’ It is found in Domesday precisely the same
as at the present day. Yet Professor Earle writes of “Wilburgewella”
that it is “an interesting name as showing the naturalized form of the
Latin _villa_, of which the ordinary Saxon equivalent was _haga_” (Land
Charters, p. 130). This latter equation seems to be most surprising. It
is traceable apparently to a charter of 855, in which we read of “unam
villam quod nos Saxonice ‘an hagan’ dicimus” (Ib. p. 336), an obviously
suspicious phrase. There is no ground for terming the ‘Ceolmundinge
haga’ of a starred document (Ib. p. 315) a villa, while the ‘haga’ of
another (Ib. p. 364) is clearly a _haw_, as in ‘Bassishaw.’ Yet another
charter (Ib. p. 447) is not in point.
[23] But the more closely one investigates the subject the more
difficult one finds it to speak with absolute confidence as to the
original existence, in any given instance, of an _ing_ in the modern
suffixes _-ingham_ and _-ington_.
[24] “It is probable that all the primitive villages in whose name the
patronymic _ing_ occurs were originally colonized by communities
united either really by blood or by the belief in a common descent
(see Kemble)”--Stubbs (Const. Hist). “Harling abode by Harling and
Billing by Billing, and each ‘wick’ and ‘ham’ and ‘stead’ and ‘tun’
took its name from the kinsmen who dwelt together in it. In this way
the house or ham of the Billings was Billingham, and the township of
the Harlings was Harlington”--Green (‘Making of England,’ p. 188).
“Many family names appear in different parts of England.... Thus we
find the Bassingas at Bassingbourn.... The Billings have left their
stamp at Billing, in Northampton; Billingford, in Norfolk; Billingham,
in Durham; Billingley, in Yorkshire; Billinghurst, in Sussex; and
five other places in various other counties. Birmingham, Nottingham,
Wellington, Faringdon, Warrington, and Wallingford are well-known names
formed on the same analogy.... Speaking generally these clan names
are thickest along the original English coast, etc.”--Grant Allen
(Anglo-Saxon Britain,’ p. 43).
[25] “The German theory, formerly generally accepted, that free village
communities were the rule among the English, seems to have little
direct evidence to support it” (Social England, i. 125).
[26] Ibid. i. 130; cf. Canon Taylor: “The Saxon immigration was
doubtless an immigration of clans.... In the Saxon districts of the
island we find the names not of individuals, but of clans.”
[27] The exceptions that he admits are too slight to affect this
general statement.
[28] Stubbs, _ut supra_.
[29] Canon Taylor relies on the passage, “Ida was Eopping, Eoppa was
Esing,” etc.
[30] Saxons in England, i. 449–456, where he treats such names as
“Brytfordingas” as “patronymical.”
[31] Ed. 1888, p. 79.
[32] I do not overlook the possibility of ‘hall’ (_hala_) being
a subsequent addition (as in post-Domesday times), but in these cases
it was part of the name at least as early as the Conquest, and the
presumption must be all in favour of the name being derived from an
individual not from a clan.
[33] Saxons in England, i. 56.
[34] Ibid. i. 58 _et seq._
[35] “Hence we perceive the value of this word [_ing_] as an
instrument of historical research. For a great number of cases it
enables us to assign to each of the great Germanic clans its precise
share in the colonization of the several portions of our island.”
[36] Anglo-Saxon Britain, pp. 81–2.
[37] Heming or Haming was a personal name which occurs in Domesday, and
which has originated a modern surname.
[38] Even by Kemble, as in ‘Saxons in England,’ i. 60–79; but he terms
it a “slight” cause of inaccuracy.
[39] ‘Wihtmund minister’ is found in 938 (Earle’s ‘Land Charters,’ p.
326), and ‘Widmundesfelt’ in the earliest extant Essex charter (Ib.
p. 13). It is, therefore, amazing that Professor Earle, dealing with
the phrase “æt Hwætmundes stane” (Ib. p. 317), should have gone out of
his way to adopt a theory started by Mr. Kerslake in the ‘Antiquary,’
connecting it with the “sculptured stone in Panier Alley,” writing:
“If now the _mund_ of ‘Wheatmund’ might be this _mand_ [basket], then
_hwætmundes stane_ would be the stone of the wheatmaund, and the
‘antiquum petrosum ædificium’ may have been the block of masonry that
was once the platform or basis of a market cross which had become
the usual pitching-place of cereal produce” (Ib. p. 318). This is an
admirable instance of that perverse Folk-etymology which has worked
such havoc with our place-names. Morant’s derivation in the last
century of ‘Widemondefort,’ from ‘a wide mound,’ is comparatively
harmless in its simplicity.
[40] Calendar of Bodleian Charters, p. 80.
[41] ‘Ac’ was the Domesday equivalent of ‘oak.’
[42] Dorset Domesday, p. 57.
[43] So Kemble derived it from the “Færingas.”
[44] Saxons in England, i. 63.
[45] Saxons in England, i. 475.
[46] I have shown (‘Feudal England,’ 103–106) that the _solanda_ of
other counties is not (as Seebohm thought, following Hale) in any way
the same as the _sulung_.
[47] See Earle’s ‘Land Charters,’ pp. 18, 24, 33, 49, 51, 54, 58, 60,
75, 78, 80, 82, 87, 95, 96, 100, 105, 124, 126, 133, 142, 152, 209.
[48] Ibid. pp. 4, 5, 7, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 20–24, 26, 29, 31, 40, 45,
etc.
[49] Feudal England, pp. 421 _et seq._
[50] English Historical Review, xi. 740, 741.
[51] Norm. Conq., iv. 56–7.
[52] According to the Peterborough Chronicle, he gave 40 marcs for this
reconciliation.
[53] Norman Conquest, vol. iv., App. C.
[54] The italics are mine.
[55] English Historical Review, xii. 109, 110.
[56] Ibid.
[57] 5th Report Hist. MSS., i. 452.
[58] The italics are mine.
[59] Compare Dr. Sheppard’s remarks in 5th Report Hist. MSS., i. 452
_a_. It would take us too far afield to undertake the distinct task of
reconciling the clause in A.I (Ibid.) with Lanfranc’s letter to the
pope, which implies, as Mr. Freeman observes, that there was but one
hearing, namely, that at Winchester (Norm. Conq., iv. 358). The clause
in A.I asserts an adjournment of the hearing at Easter (Winchester),
and a decision of the case at Whitsuntide (Windsor).
[60] I need not print the list, as it will be found in the
‘Monasticon,’ and in Kempe’s ‘Historical Notices of St. Martin’s le
Grand,’ as well as in Mr. Stevenson’s paper.
[61] E. H. R., xii. 109 note.
[62] Norm. Conq., vol. iv., App. C.
[63] See ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p. 435. I do not guarantee the
derivation.
[64] Mon. Ang., ii. 302.
[65] He is also clearly the “Eustachius de Huntedune” mentioned under
Stamford (D. B. 336 _b_).
[66] Norman Conquest, vol. ii.
[67] Const. Hist., i. 243.
[68] pp. viii., 299.
[69] See for the above quotations my ‘Feudal England,’ pp. 346, 354–6.
[70] William was familiar with this formation, for he makes, Mr.
Freeman wrote, Henry I. bid his English stand firm “in the array of the
ancient shield wall.”
[71] Feudal England, p. 354.
[72] Norman Conquest (2nd ed., iii. 764).
[73] Miss Norgate recognises this as “the English shield wall”
(‘England under the Angevin Kings,’ i. 292).
[74] Art of War, p. 26; History of the Art of War, p. 163.
[75] See, for these quotations, Freeman’s ‘Norman Conquest,’ iii. (2nd
ed.), 491 (where he quotes parallels from Dion Cassius and Ammianus),
and compare my ‘Feudal England,’ p. 358.
[76] History of the Art of War, p. 61.
[77] Ibid. p. 58.
[78] Ibid. p. 36.
[79] See above, p. 40.
[80] The italics are mine.
[81] The _spissa testudo_ of Florence is “of course” conveniently
ignored.
[82] “When the compact shield wall was broken, William thrust his
horsemen into the gaps” (p. 300). Just so.
[83] ‘Athenæum,’ 6th Aug., 1898. Mr. Oman had previously tried to
escape from his own words by pleading that “silence does not mean
a change of opinion” (‘Academy,’ 9th June, 1894). But I had been
careful to explain that I did not rely on his ‘silence,’ but on his
actually _substituting_ ‘shield wall’ for ‘palisades’ in the above
reproduced sentence (‘Academy,’ 19th May, 1894). Similarly, Mr. Oman,
as Col. Lloyd has observed (‘English Historical Review,’ x. 538),
“takes a different view” of the English formation at Crecy in the
latter of these two works from that which he had taken in the earlier,
substituting a wholly different arrangement of the archers.
[84] Mr. Freeman wrote of a “fortress of timber” with “wooden walls,”
composed of “firm barricades of ash and other timber” (see ‘Feudal
England,’ p. 340). Mr. George emphatically rejected this conception
(‘Battles of English History’).
[85] ‘Norman Conquest,’ iii. (2nd ed.), 476, faithfully reproducing
Henry of Huntingdon’s “dudum antequam coirent bellatores.”
[86] Guy of Amiens describes him as “Agmina præcedens innumerosa ducis.”
[87] Art of War, p. 25.
[88] Social England, p. 299.
[89] Academy, 9th June, 1894.
[90] History of the Art of War, p. 154.
[91] Mr. Oman, in his latest work, makes “brushwood” the material.
I had pointed out “the difficulty of hauling timber” under the
circumstances (‘Feudal England,’ p. 342).
[92] English Historical Review, ix. 18; cf. ix. 10.
[93] Ibid. ix. 232, 237–8.
[94] History of the Art of War, p. vi.
[95] English Historical Review, ix. 239.
[96] Ibid. p. 14.
[97] See Feudal England, pp. 354–8, 392.
[98] Die Schlacht von Hastings (Berlin), 1896.
[99] Athenæum, July 30, 1898.
[100] Mr. Oman, for instance, writes of the English “ditch and the
mound made of the earth cast up from it and crowned by the breastworks”
(p. 154), although Mr. Freeman treated “the English fosse” as quite
distinct from “the palisades, and at a distance from them” (‘English
Historical Review,’ ix. 213). Mr. Archer has had to admit this.
[101] This is also the conclusion of Sir J. Ramsay.
[102] Feudal England, p. 361.
[103] Feudal England, pp. 354–358, 363, 367–8.
[104] Ibid. p. 358.
[105] Ibid. pp. 356–358.
[106] For further details on this subject, and a bibliography of the
whole controversy, see ‘Sussex Archæological Collections,’ vol. xlii.
[107] “Lincoln Castle, as regards its earthworks, belongs to that
type of English fortress in which the mound has its proper ditch,
and is placed on one side of an appended area, also with its bank
and ditch.... In general, these fortresses are much alike, and all
belong to that class of burhs known to have been thrown up by the
English in the ninth and tenth centuries” (Clark’s ‘Mediæval Military
Architecture,’ ii. 192).
[108] 9th July, 1898.
[109] Mediæval Military Architecture, i. 24, 25.
[110] Athenæum, July, 1898.
[111] History of the Art of War, p. 525. The italics are mine.
[112] Athenæum, 30th July, 1898.
[113] Ibid., 6th August, 1898.
[114] Ibid., 13th August, 1898.
[115] The acting editor of the ‘Athenæum’ refused to insert my final
reply explaining this.
[116] Appendix to ‘Ypodigma Neustriæ,’ p. 518.
[117] Flores Historiarum (Rolls), ii. 490.
[118] Ibid. p. 491.
[119] “Ipsi, obsidione turris fortissimæ, quam bellicis insultibus
et machinarum ictibus viisque subterraneis expugnatam, fuissent in
proximo adepturi, protinus dimissa, Londonias repetierunt” (‘Flores
Historiarum,’ ii. 491). Compare ‘Ypodigma Neustriæ,’ p. 518.
[120] Archæological Journal, xx. 205–223 (1863).
[121] First in the ‘English Historical Review’ and then in my ‘Feudal
England.’
[122] This was clearly the rule, though there may have been a few
exceptions. Compare p. 155 below.
[123] Feudal England, p. 234.
[124] History of the Art of War, p. 359.
[125] Ibid.
[126] Domesday Book and Beyond, pp. 450, 451.
[127] History of the Art of War.
[128] Feudal England, p. 234.
[129] History of the Art of War, p. 360.
[130] History of the Art of War, p. 362.
[131] I use the term, for convenience, in 1168.
[132] “_Habeo_ ij milites et dimidium feffatos de veteri
feffamento” (‘Liber Rubeus,’ p. 292).
[133] I may add that Mr. Oman misquotes this _carta_ in his
endeavour to extract from it support for his error about the ‘five
hides’ (p. 57 above). I place his rendering by the side of the text.
“unusquisque de i ... “only for one virgate
virgata. Et ita habetis ij each. _From them you can make
milites et dimidium feodatos.” up a knight_, and so you have
two and a half knights
enfeoffed” (p. 362).
The words I have italicised are, it will be seen, interpolated.
[134] See also Eyton’s ‘History of Shropshire,’ i. 232, and the ‘Cartæ
baronum’ (1166) _passim_.
[135] This allusion has perhaps been somewhat overlooked by legal
historians.
[136] Curiosities and Antiquities of the Exchequer.
[137] “Videtur autem eis obviare qui dicunt album firmæ a temporibus
Anglicorum cœpisse, quod in libro judiciario in quo totius regni
descriptio diligens continetur, et tam de tempore regis Edwardi quam de
tempore regis Willelmi sub quo factus est, singulorum fundorum valentia
exprimitur, nulla prorsus de albo firmæ fit mentio” (‘Dialogus,’ I.
vi.).
[138] Rot. magni Scacc. Norm., I. xv.
[139] The Foundations of England, i. 524; ii. 324.
[140] “Ubi cum per aliquos annos persedisset, comperit hoc solutionis
genere non plene fisco satisfieri: licet enim in numero et pondere
videretur satisfactum, non tamen in materia ... Ut igitur regiæ
simul et publicæ provideretur utilitati, habito super hoc ipso regis
consilio, constitutum est ut fieret ordine prædicto firmæ combustio vel
examinatio” (‘Dialogus,’ I. vii.).
[141] “Libræ arsæ et pensatæ,” “Libræ ad arsuram et pensum,” “Libræ ad
pensum et arsuram,” “Libræ ad pondus et arsuram,” “Libræ ad ignem et ad
pensum,” etc.
[142] Even Sir James Ramsay, though rightly sceptical as to the
attribution of certain innovations, by the writer of the ‘Dialogus,’ to
Bishop Roger, holds that “the revenues of the Anglo-Saxon kings were to
a considerable extent paid in kind; and so they were down to the time
of Henry I., who abolished the practice, establishing money payments in
all cases” (i. 525).
[143] Cf. p. 205.
[144] “Hiis vero solutis secundum constitutum modum cujusque rei,
regii officiales computabant vicecomiti _redigentes in summam
denariorum_: pro mensura scilicet tritici ad panem c hominum,
solidum unum,” etc., etc.
[145] Compare my remarks on the quick growth, in those days of
erroneous tradition, in ‘Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer,’ p.
77.
[146] pp. 109–115. Professor Maitland has subsequently spoken of it in
two or three passages of ‘Domesday Book and Beyond.’
[147] “The Conqueror at Exeter” (‘Feudal England’).
[148] D. B., i. 108.
[149] D. B., i. 108.
[150] Barnstaple rendered forty shillings ‘ad pensum’ to the king,
and twenty ‘ad numerum’ to the bishop of Coutances; Lidford sixty ‘ad
pensum’; Totnes “olim reddebat iii lib. ad pensum et arsuram,” but,
after passing into private hands, its render was raised to “viii lib.
ad numerum.” Exeter itself ‘rendered’ £6 “ad pensum et arsuram” to the
king, and £12 ‘ad numerum’ for Queen Edith.
[151] D. B., i. 100 _b_-101.
[152] Feudal England, p. 115.
[153] D. B., i. 120.
[154] Cf. Feudal England, pp. 109–110.
[155] Feudal England, pp. 109–110.
[156] After the above passage, the author proceeds: “De summa vero
summarum quæ ex omnibus fundis surgebant in uno comitatu, constituerunt
vicecomitem illius comitatus ad scaccarium teneri” (i. 7).
[157] A Devonshire manor (i. 100 _b_) is entered as rendering “in
firma regis x solidos ad pensum.” This “firma” can only be a collective
ferm from the royal manors.
[158] I do not wish to press the point further than the entry proves,
and consequently I leave undetermined the question whether the ‘firma
regis’ was that of the whole shire, or merely that of the head manor to
which Wedmore belonged.
[159] Geoffrey de Mandeville, p. 142.
[160] History and Antiquities of the Exchequer, p. 63.
[161] It was vehemently asserted by Mr. Hubert Hall, in his earlier
papers on the Exchequer, that the table was only divided into columns,
and that the chequered table was a delusion. He has subsequently
himself accepted the “chequered table” (see my ‘Studies on the Red
Book,’ p. 76), but Sir James Ramsay (ii. 324) has been misled by his
original assertion.
[162] “Sciendum vero quod per hanc taleam combustionis dealbatur firma
vicecomitis; unde in testimonium hujus rei semper majori taleæ appensa
cohæret” (‘Dialogus’).
[163] pp. 523–4.
[164] p. 105.
[165] “Henricus thesaurarius,” the Domesday tenant (49), is entered in
the earlier Winchester survey _temp._ Hen. I.
[166] One such writ, still preserved, is printed in my ‘Ancient
Charters’ (Pipe Roll Society). It belongs to 1191.
[167] See below.
[168] I punctuate it differently from Dr. Stubbs.
[169] Itinerary, p. 275.
[170] Antiquities of the Exchequer, p. 15.
[171] Ibid. p. 16.
[172] Ibid.
[173] Ibid. p. 66.
[174] See my ‘Calendar of Documents Preserved in France.’
[175] Ibid. p. 354.
[176] Ibid. p. 355.
[177] Ibid. p. 354.
[178] See the ‘Constitutio domus Regis’:--“Willelmus Maudut xiiii
_d._ in die, et assidue in Domo Commedet,” etc. etc. He comes next
to the Treasurer.
[179] Mediæval Military Architecture, ii. 400.
[180] See my “King Stephen and the Earl of Chester” (‘English
Historical Review,’ x. 91).
[181] Testa de Nevill., 231.
[182] Ibid. 235; and ‘Red Book of the Exchequer,’ p. 460.
[183] Pipe Roll 2 Hen. II. See ‘Red Rook of the Exchequer,’ p.
664:--“Garino filio Geroldi xxxiiij lib. bl. in Worde.” Although the
subject is one of special interest for the editor, he does not index
Garin’s name here at all, while he identifies “Worde” in the Index (p.
1358), as “Worthy” (Hants), though it was Highworth, Wilts.
[184] Red Book of the Exchequer, pp. 355, 356.
[185] “Garinus filius Geroldi Suvenhantone, per serjanteriam cameræ
(_sic_) Regis” (Ibid. p. 486). (Should ‘cameræ’ be ‘camerariæ’?).
Also “ut sit Camerarius Regis” (‘Testa,’ p. 148).
[186] “Margeria de Ripariis tenet villam de Creklade de camar[aria]
domini regis ad scaccarium: Eadem Margeria tenet villam de
Sevenha[m]pton cum pertinentiis de domino rege per predictum servitium”
(‘Testa de Nevill.,’ p. 153).
[187] See ‘Red Book of the Exchequer,’ and ‘Testa de Nevill.’
[188] Red Book of the Exchequer, p. cccxv.
[189] For a similar misdescription of the document preceding it see my
‘Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer,’ p. 61.
[190] History of the Exchequer.
[191] Antiquities of the Exchequer, pp. 144–6, 165, 167.
[192] At Portsmouth, the witnesses being Geoffrey the chancellor, Nigel
de Albini, and Geoffrey de Clinton.
[193] Oliver’s ‘Monasticon Diocesis Exoniensis,’ p. 134.
[194] Ed. Arnold, i. 269.
[195] “Numero satisfaciunt; quales sunt Salop, Sudsex, Northumberland
et Cumberland” (i. 7). Shropshire is wanting on the Roll.
[196] “Hæc per subtractionem xii denariorum e singulis libris
dealbantur” (ii. 27).
[197] Rot. Pip., 31 Hen. I. p. 122.
[198] Indeed, the statement that this ferm was fixed by the Conqueror
is at variance with the evidence of Domesday, which says, “reddit
L libras ad arsuram et pensum” (i. 16).
[199] Vol. ii. p. 115.
[200] It should be observed that the plea was decided by reference to
the “liber de thesauro” (Domesday Book, 156 _b_) and that “liber
ille ... sigilli regii comes est in thesauro” (‘Dialogus,’ i. 15).
Therefore, “cum orta fuerit in regno contentio de his rebus quæ illic
annotantur” (Ibid. i. 16), the plea would conveniently be held “in
thesauro.”
[201] See my paper on “Bernard the Scribe” in the ‘English Historical
Review,’ 1899.
[202] Introduction to Dialogus.
[203] Ibid.
[204] “Id quoque sui esse juris suique specialiter privilegii ut si rex
ipsorum quoquo modo obiret, alius suo provisu in regno substituendus e
vestigio succederet” (‘Gesta Stephani’; see ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’
p. 2).
[205] Ibid.
[206] Longmans, 1892.
[207] Assuming the regnal years of Stephen to be reckoned in the usual
manner, of which I have felt some doubts.
[208] ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p. 252.
[209] Ibid. p. 373.
[210] He was the third named of the fifteen benefactors, who, to obtain
the king’s confirmation, “miserunt ... quendam ex seipsis, Ordgarum
scilicet le Prude,” to Henry. He occurs in one of the St. Paul’s
documents (Hist. MSS. Report, p. 68 _a_), but what Mr. Loftie has
written about him (‘London,’ pp. 35–6) is merely based on confusion
with other Ordgars.
[211] Vol. iv. fo. 737, of the Guildhall Transcript.
[212] He appears to take his stand on possession alone.
[213] The king decides to examine the title by a proprietary action.
[214] ‘Christo’ in Ancient Deeds, A. 6683.
[215] As is not unfrequently the case in similar narratives, this
charter is wrongly introduced; for it clearly cannot be so early
as 1137. It was edited by me in ‘Ancient Charters’ (p. 48) from
Ancient Deeds, A. 6683, and assigned to 1143–1148, as being obviously
subsequent to the fall of the earl of Essex.
[216] See ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ pp. 222–4.
[217] Trans: ‘Englis_t_c_u_it’ (the ‘t’ and ‘u’ being obvious
misreadings). The text is, it will be seen, corrupt.
[218] Trans: ‘Crichcote.’
[219] Report _ut supra_, p. 66 _b_; ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’
pp. 435–6.
[220] Report _ut supra_, pp. 61 _b_, 67 _b_; cf. ‘Domesday of St.
Paul’s,’ p. 124.
[221] London and Middlesex Archæological Transactions, vol. v., pp.
477–493. These documents are the same as those entered in the Priory’s
cartulary.
[222] Ibid. p. 480; cf. pp. 490, 491.
[223] London, p. 30.
[224] “Seven or eight” on p. 30.
[225] Ibid. p. 31.
[226] Even Dr. Stubbs seems to imply this when he alludes to “the
conversion of the cnihtengild into a religious house” (‘Const. Hist.’
[1874], i. 406).
[227] Compare “the retirement at one time of _seven_ or _eight_
aldermen” only three pages before (p. 30).
[228] p. 33. So also pp. 34, 42, 90.
[229] Coote, _ut supra_, p. 478.
[230] Good instances in point are found in the Ramsey cartulary, where,
in 1081, a benefactor to the abbey “suscepit e contra a domno abbate
et ab omnibus fratribus plenam fraternitatem pro rege Willelmo, et
pro regina Matilda, et pro comite Roberto, et pro semetipso, et uxore
sua, et filio qui ejus erit heres, et pro patre et matre ejus, ut sunt
participes orationum, elemosinarum, et omnium beneficiorum ipsorum, sed
et omnium fratrum sive monasteriorum a quibus societatem susceperunt
in omnibus sicut ex ipsis” (i. 127–8). Better still is this parallel:
“Reynaldus abbas, et totus fratrum conventus de Rameseya cunctis
fratribus qui sunt apud Ferefeld in gilda, salutem in Christo. Volumus
ut sciatis quod vobis nostrum fraternitatem concessimus et communionem
beneficii quam pro nobismet ipsis quotidie agimus, per Serlonem, qui
vester fuit legatus ad nos, ut sitis participes in hoc et in futuro
sæculo” (i. 131). The date of this transaction was about the same as
that of the admission of the cnihtengild to a share in the “benefits”
of Holy Trinity; and the grant was similarly made in return for an
endowment.
[231] See “The First Mayor of London” (‘Antiquary,’ April, 1887).
[232] Coote, _ut supra_, p. 478.
[233] Report, _ut supra_, p. 68 _a_.
[234] Ibid. p. 62 _a_.
[235] 5th Report Hist. MSS., App. I., p. 446 _b_.
[236] Rot. Pip., 31 Hen. I.
[237] _Infra_, p. 118.
[238] Antiquary, as above.
[239] Rot. Pip., 31 Hen. I.
[240] Report, i. 83 _b_. It is several years later than 1125.
[241] See p. 101, above.
[242] Coote, _ut supra_, p. 473.
[243] Tomlin’s ‘Perambulation of Islington,’ pp. 60–64.
[244] Report, _ut supra_, p. 42 _a_.
[245] See, for him, below.
[246] Add MS. 14,252, fo. 127 _d_.
[247] ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ pp. 310, 311.
[248] Ibid. It is remarkable that this man, who (as I have there shown)
was joint sheriff of London in 1125, is found as the last witness to a
charter of Henry I., granted (apparently in 1120) at Caen (Colchester
Cartulary, fo. 10).
[249] Ibid. p. 311.
[250] See above, p. 106.
[251] Ramsey Cartulary, i. 139.
[252] Rot. Pip., 31 Henry I., p. 145. See also Ramsey Cartulary, i. 142.
[253] ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p. 309.
[254] See my ‘Ancient Charters’ (Pipe Roll Society), p. 26.
[255] The transcriber seems to have been unable to read these words.
[256] Lansdown MS. 170, fo. 73.
[257] See also the charter on p. 115 (note 3) below.
[258] Sheriff again from 1157 to 1160.
[259] “Writelam ... Ingelricus præoccupavit ii hidas de terra prepositi
Haroldi ... postquam rex venit in Angliam et modo tenet comes
E[ustachius] ideo quod antecessor ejus inde fuit saisitus” (Domesday,
ii. 5 _b_).
[260] Lansd. MS. 170, fo. 62.
[261] “The influential family of Bucquinte, Bucca-Uncta, which took
the lead on many occasions, can hardly have been other than Italian”
(‘Const. Hist.,’ i. 631). The Bucherels also, clearly were of Italian
origin (“Bucherelli”).
[262] Ibid.
[263] “Benedictus I., 155–6” (Dr. Stubbs’ authority).
[264] Ibid.
[265] See p. 108, above.
[266] Duchy of Lancaster Charters, L. 107. “Notum sit tam
presentibus quam futuris quod ego Johannes filius Andree Bucuinte
heredavi in hustingo Londonie (_sic_) Gervasium de Cornhell[a] et
Henricum filium eius et heredes suos de omnibus rectis meis in terris
in catallis Et etiam in omnibus aliis rebus et quieta clamavi eis et
heredibus eorum hereditario jure tenendis et abendis (_sic_). Et
pro hac conventione dederunt mihi Gervasius de Cornhell[a] et Henricus
filius unam dimidiam marcam argenti. Et hoc idem feci in curia Regis
apud Westmonasterium. Et ibi dedit mihi Gervasius de Cornhella i marcam
argenti. Et ego Johannes filius Andree Bucuinte saisiavi Gervasium
de Cornhell[e] et Henricum filium eius de omnibus tailiis meis et de
cartis meis in curia Regis et in hustingo Lond[onie].”
[267] Cartulary, i. 130.
[268] See p. 106, above.
[269] Cartulary of St. John’s, Colchester, pp. 293–4.
[270] England under the Angevin Kings, pp. 156–7.
[271] i. 157. Hoveden ends: “Præcepit eum suspendi inpatibulo”.
[272] See above, p. 107.
[273] This also was the name of a leading London family.
[274] Dr. Stubbs quotes from the roll of 1169: “de catallis fugitivorum
et suspensorum per assisam de Clarendon.”
[275] See my note on Osbert in ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ App. Q (pp.
374–5).
[276] Ibid.
[277] Lansd. MS., 170, fo. 62 _d_. The terms of this writ are
of some legal importance in connection with the principle of “novel
disseisin” under Henry II. The recovery of seisin is here a preliminary
to a proprietary action, and the formula “injuste et sine judicio” (cf.
‘History of English Law,’ ii. 47, 57) recurs in this charter which is
of similar illustrative value: “Stephanus rex Angl[orum] Waltero filio
Gisleberti et preposito suo de Mealdona salutem. Si Canonici Sancti
Martini London’ poterint monstrare quod Oswardus de Meldon’ injuste et
sine judicio illos dissaisierit de terra sua de Meldon’ de Burgag’ tunc
precipio quod illos faciat[is] resaisiri sicut saisiti fuerunt die quo
Rex Henricus fuit vivus et mortuus. Et quicquid inde cepit postea reddi
juste faciatis et in pace teneant sicut tenuerunt tempore regis Henrici
et eadem consuetudine, et nisi feceritis Ricardus de Lucy et vicecomes
de Essex faciant fieri ne audiam inde clamorem pro penuria recti. Teste
Warnerio de Lusoriis apud London’” (Ib., fo. 170).
[278] It was almost certainly previous to Stephen’s captivity, though
this cannot be actually proved.
[279] Another writ of Stephen (date uncertain) similarly recognises
his position:--“Stephanus dei gratia Rex Anglie Osberto Octod[enarii]
et Adel (_sic_) et civibus et vic[ecomiti] Lond[onie] salutem.
Precipio quod canonici Sancti Martini London[ie] bene et in pace et
honorifice teneant terras suas et estalla sua que eis reddidi et
confirmavi” (fo. 57 _d_).
[280] Endorsed “de Cancellario” (9th Report Hist. MSS., i. 45 _b_).
[281] Athenæum, 23rd January, 1897.
[282] “Justitiarium qualem voluerint de se ipsis.”
[283] See ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p. 305.
[284] Ibid. p. 150.
[285] Quum.
[286] We probably should read “Osberto clerico Willelmi archidiaconi.”
[287] Attests a charter of the earl’s son and namesake in 1157–8 as
“Willelmo de Moch’ capellano meo” (‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p. 229).
[288] Attests same charter (Ibid.).
[289]? Gisleberto.
[290] Ailwin son of Leofstan and Robert de Ponte occur in the London
charters of St. Paul’s about this time.
[291] Subsequently sheriff of Essex (see p. 109 above).
[292] This charter, I understand, is taken from the roll at St. Paul’s,
which was purposely left uncalendared in Sir H. Maxwell Lyte’s report
on the St. Paul’s MSS.
[293] See p. 102.
[294] Add. Cart. 28, 346.
[295] See my paper on “Faramus of Boulogne” (Genealogist [N. S.] xii.
151).
[296] Simone de Suttuna, Wulfwardo de Autona (Carshalton), etc.
[297] See ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville.’
[298] Rot. Pip. 31 Hen. I. p. 146.
[299] Ibid. p. 147.
[300] ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville.’
[301] Rot. Pip. 31 Hen. I. p. 146.
[302] Ibid.
[303] See above, p. 110.
[304] Add. Cart. 28, 344.
[305] Not to be confused with an (under) sheriff of Salop a generation
earlier.
[306] Cartulary of St. John’s, Colchester (Roxburghe Club), p. 78.
[307] Ramsey Cartulary, i. 139, where it is assigned to 1114–1123.
[308] Ibid. i. 144.
[309] Ibid. i. 152.
[310] Ibid. i. 148, 240.
[311] Ibid. i. 245.
[312] Ibid. i. 131.
[313] MS. Arundel, 28.
[314] Rot. Pip. 31 Hen. I. p. 100.
[315] Rot. Pip. 31 Hen. I. p. 72.
[316] Report, p. 25 _b_.
[317] Ramsey Cartulary, i. 256.
[318] See p. 101 above.
[319] 28th Sept., 1889.
[320] The Red Book of the Exchequer, Ed. Hubert Hall, F.S.A.,
of the Public Record Office (Master of the Rolls Series), pp.
cclxvii.-cclxxxiv.
[321] This phrase and the “sine judicio,” which the Articles employ as
its opposite, should be compared with the formula for the Assize of
Novel Disseisin.
[322] Rot. Pip. 14 Hen. II. p. 124 (“Honor Willelmi filii Alani”).
[323] See ‘Liber Rubeus,’ p. 272.
[324] Swereford’s ‘dictum’ is wrong, of course, here as elsewhere (see
my ‘Studies on the Red Book’).
[325] See, for example, pp. 75–7, 77–8.
[326] Or rather 1172 (Rot. Pip., 18 Hen. II.), “1171” being Mr. Hall’s
date.
[327] Roland de Dinan, Ralf de Toeni, Goscelin the queen’s brother
(Rot. 18 Hen. II., p. 132).
[328] Rot. 14 Hen. II., p. 194.
[329] Rot. 6 Ric. I. (according to Dugdale).
[330] Liber Rubeus, pp. 113, 147.
[331] Rot. 21 Hen. II., p. 82.
[332] History of Shropshire, ii. 201.
[333] Feudal England, p. 245; Geoffrey de Mandeville, p. 322.
[334] Rot. 14 Hen. II., p. 29.
[335] _i.e._ 1172.
[336] Rot. 18 Hen. II., p. 30.
[337] Genealogist (N. S.), vol. i.
[338] See my ‘Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer’ (1898), printed
for private circulation, _passim_.
[339] This paper, written a few years ago, is a sketch based on (1) The
Song of Dermot and the Earl. Edited by G. A. Orpen. Oxford, 1892. (2)
Giraldi Cambrensis Opera, vol. v. Edited by J. F. Dimock. London, 1867.
(3) The Book of Howth. Edited by J. S. Brewer, 1871.
[340] English Historical Review, vol. iv.
[341] See the paper below on ‘The Marshalship of England.’
[342] English Historical Review, viii. 132.
[343] See my ‘Early Life of Anne Boleyn.’
[344] Romania, xxi. 444–451.
[345] See ‘Feudal England,’ pp. 516–518.
[346] Morant’s Essex, i. 331 note. Morant gives no reference for this
early and interesting charter, but I have lately been fortunate enough
to find it in Lansd. MS. fo. 170, where it is transcribed among some
local records from “Placita corone, 13 Edw. I.” It must, therefore,
have been produced in 1284–5.
[347] Son of the earl of Arundel.
[348] MS. Hargrave 313, fo. 44 _d_ (pencil).
[349] Selden Society publications, iv. 17.
[350] See also ‘Feudal England.’ Mr. Oman, of course, questions my
theory; but scholars, I understand, accept it (see pp. 56–7 above).
[351] See also my paper on “The Barons of the Naas” in ‘Genealogist.’
[352] 14th March, 1895.
[353] Book of Howth (Carew Papers), p. 23. It would be of great
interest to the genealogical student to connect these Fitz Urses of
Ulster with the English family of the name, one of whom, Reginald, was
among the murderers of Becket (cf. ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p. 53).
Proof may be found, I think, among the charters of Stoke Curcy Priory,
Somerset, now at Eton (9th Report Hist. MSS., i. p. 353). The Fitz
Urses and De Curcis are found together among the Priory’s benefactors,
and William de Curci is the first witness to a charter of Reginald Fitz
Urse. We further find (Ibid.) a charter of William de Curci, to which
“John de Curci, Jordan de Curci” are witnessed. As the conqueror of
Ulster had a brother Jordan who was slain by the Irish, it is probable
that he may be found in this John de Curci, and his _provenance_
thus established. It is probable, therefore, that he was followed by
Fitz Urse to Ulster from Somerset, and possibly even by Russell (Ibid.
pp. 354 _a_, _b_).
[354] This was written some years ago.
[355] By the 22nd article of the Irish peace of January, 1648, the
natives were promised the repeal of two statutes, one against “the
ploughing with horses by the tail,” and the other prohibiting “the
burning of oats in the straw.”
[356] As this paper goes to press, the news arrives (3rd April, 1899)
of Mr. Davitt being stoned by his fellow-patriots at Swinford.
[357] Irish Ecclesiastical Record.
[358] See ‘Times,’ 8th Feb., 1886, p. 8.
[359] It has been so long spoken of as a “Bull” that one hardly knows
how to describe it. So long, however, as it is realized that it was
only a letter commendatory, no mistake can arise.
[360] Rolls Series, Edition v., 318.
[361] Ed. Hearne (1774), i. 42–48.
[362] Dublin Review, 3rd Ser., vol. 10, pp. 83–4.
[363] Ireland and St. Patrick, pp. 66, 68.
[364] Dublin Review, _ut supra_, pp. 93, 95.
[365] Ireland and St. Patrick (2nd Ed., 1892), pp. 65–147.
[366] Ibid. pp. 65, 85.
[367] Ibid. p. 143.
[368] Dublin Review, _ut supra_, p. 101.
[369] Ireland and St. Patrick, p. 128.
[370] Ibid. p. 121.
[371] Ireland and St. Patrick, pp. 128–9.
[372] The latest German papers appear to be those of Scheffer-Boichort
in ‘Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreich-Geschichtsforschung,’
Erganzungsband iv. (1892); and of Pflugk-Harttung in ‘Deutsche
Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft,’ x. (1894).
[373] E. H. R., viii. pp. 18–52.
[374] Ibid. p. 42.
[375] “The majority of historians,” Miss Norgate writes (E. H. R.,
viii. 18), “have assumed that these two statements are two genuine and
independent accounts of one real transaction.” On this I pronounce,
for the present, no opinion; but I have printed the parallel passages
above, that readers may form their own opinion as to the points of
resemblance.
[376] It has, of course, been asserted to be an interpolation. But,
provisionally, I speak of it as his.
[377] Compare ‘England under the Angevin Kings,’ ii. 96 note, with E.
H. R., viii. 20. Miss Norgate might have learnt the fact from Cardinal
Moran’s paper, which was published 15 years before her work appeared.
[378] Vol. v. pp. 246–7.
[379] Ibid. pp. 318–9.
[380] Another quotation from Ovid occurs in the middle of this short
document.
[381] E. H. R., viii. 42.
[382] Ibid. p. 48.
[383] Ibid. p. 50.
[384] E. H. R., viii. 44.
[385] Ibid. p. 31.
[386] Dublin Review, _ut supra_, p. 90. So too on p. 96: “Giraldus
Cambrensis asserted that both these Bulls were produced in a synod of
Irish clergy at Waterford in A.D. 1175.” Cardinal Moran also
argued from this date.
[387] Ireland and St. Patrick, p. 131. He speaks, however, doubtless
by oversight, of “the confirmatory letter of Alexander III. himself in
1177” (p. 141), though it belongs to the same date.
[388] This is the erroneous form adopted by Professor Tout.
[389] Dictionary of National Biography, xix. 104.
[390] The words “per breve Ricardi de Luci” imply the king’s absence
from England, so that if William was despatched to Ireland in 1171, it
must have been before the king’s return on August 3. The charge would,
therefore, have appeared on the (Michaelmas) Pipe Roll.
[391] England under the Angevin Kings, ii. 115.
[392] Vol. v., p. lxxxiii.
[393] Close of 1171, or beginning of 1172.
[394] England under the Angevin Kings, ii. 116.
[395] “Hibernico populo tam dominandi quam ipsum in fidei rudimentis
incultissimum ecclesiasticis normis et disciplinis juxta Anglicanæ
ecclesiæ mores informandi” (v. 315).
[396] “It is quite certain that the Pope did, some time before
September 20, 1172, receive reports of Henry’s proceedings in Ireland,
both from Henry himself and from the Irish bishops, for he says so
in three letters--one addressed to Henry, another to the kings and
bishops of Ireland, and the third to the legate Christian bishop of
Lismore--all dated Tusculum, September 20.”
[397] E. H. R., viii. 44.
[398] Ibid. p. 50.
[399] The letter to Henry similarly speaks of “enormitates et vicia”
described in the prelates’ letters, and of “abominationis spurcitiam.”
[400] “Suis nobis literis intimarunt, et dilectus filius noster
R. Landavensis archidiaconus, vir prudens et discretus, et Regiæ
magnitudini vinculo præcipue devotionis astrictus, qui hoc oculata
fide perspexit viva nobis voce tam solicite quam prudenter exposuit”
... “eisdem Archiepiscopis et Episcopis significantibus, et præfato
Archidiacono plenius et expressius nobis referente, comperimus.”
[401] Gesta, i. 28; and Hoveden, ii. 31.
[402] Becket materials (Rolls, vii. 227, 233).
[403] The language must have been deliberately chosen, for the bishop’s
letters and the Pope’s action are described in the same words:
“confirmantes ei et heredibus “summus pontifex auctoritate
suis regnum Hiberniæ, et apostolica confirmavit ei et
testimonium perhibentes ipsos heredibus suis regnum illud,
eum et heredes suos sibi in et eos imperpetuum reges
reges et dominos constituisse constituit” (p. 28).
imperpetuum” (p. 26).
[404] “Et quia Romana ecclesia ... aliud jus habet in Insula quam
in terra magna et continua, nos ... magnificentiam tuam rogamus et
solicite commonemus ut in præscripta terra jura beati Petri nobis
studeas sollicite conservare,” etc., etc.
[405] E. H. R., viii. 45.
[406] Ibid. p. 50.
[407] In the text of ‘De principis instructione,’ as is pretty
generally known, the words “sicut a quibusdam asseritur aut
confingitur, ab aliis autem unquam impetratum fuisse negatur,” precede
this letter. They look, Mr. Dimock thought, like a marginal note which
has found its way into the text. I confess that to me also that is what
they suggest.
[408] According to Giraldus, the sole authority for its existence.
[409] The two letters hang together absolutely, it will be seen, in
every way.
[410] Dublin Review, _ut supra_, p. 90.
[411] E. H. R., viii. 48.
[412] E. H. R., viii. 23.
[413] Dublin Review, _ut supra_, pp. 97–103.
[414] Ibid., 3rd Series, vol. xi., pp. 328–339.
[415] E. H. R., viii. 34.
[416] _Vide supra_, p. 184.
[417] Gesta, i. 28.
[418] Irish Ecclesiastical Record, p. 61.
[419] Monumenta, p. 151.
[420] Rinuccini’s Embassy in Ireland (Hutton), pp. xxviii.-xxix. For
the essential passage the Italian runs: “stimando molto a proposito
il soggettare a se l’Isola d’Irlanda, ricorse ad Adriano, e da quel
pontefice, che Inglese era, ottene con mano liberale quanto bramava. Le
zelo che Arrigo dimostrò di voler convertire alla Fede tutta l’Irlanda,
piegò l’animo di Adriano a concedergli il dominio di essa” (Aiazzi’s
Nunziatura, p. xxxvi.).
[421] Const. Hist., i. 496.
[422] Norgate’s ‘England under the Angevin Kings,’ ii. 276.
[423] Gesta [Ed. Stubbs], ii. 80–83.
[424] Ed. Stubbs, iii. 9–12.
[425] Hoveden, iii. xiv. (1870).
[426] Ibid. iii. 9 note.
[427] Chron. Maj., ii. 348 note.
[428] Hist. Ang., iii. 209 note.
[429] Historia Anglorum, iii. 209.
[430] Chronica Majora, iii. 338 marginal note.
[431] Liber Rubeus, p. 759.
[432] See my paper, below, on “the Marshalship of England.”
[433] Red Book of the Exchequer, p. xviii. Compare my ‘Studies on the
Red Book of the Exchequer,’ p. 49.
[434] Rolls Series, ii. 339 note.
[435] Ibid. ‘Chronicles of the Reigns of Stephen,’ etc., iii. 408 note.
[436] Dictionary of National Biography.
[437] Ibid.
[438] Register of St. Osmund, i. 262; and Epistolæ Cantuarienses, p.
327.
[439] The date given by Dr. Stubbs.
[440] This from Hoveden.
[441] So great, indeed, is the difficulty of forcing them into
accordance with Dr. Stubbs’ view, that he himself makes them all four
refer to a single surrender of Nottingham and Tickhill (Preface to
Rog. Hov. III. lvii., lviii.; cf. p. lxiii.), and assigns the Mortimer
incident to the earlier campaign, though it is described by Richard of
Devizes, who _ex hypothesi_ is narrating the later one.
[442] Gesta Regis Ricardi, ii. 208 note.
[443] Ed. Howlett, p. 337.
[444] It is a further illustration of the difficulty which even those
who accept Dr. Stubbs’ view find in adhering to it, that Miss Norgate
pronounces it “chronologically impossible” that the archbishop of
Rouen can have been sent to John by Longchamp, as stated by Richard of
Devizes (‘Angevin Kings,’ ii. 299 note). She must have forgotten that
Richard of Devizes _ex hypothesi_ is describing “events in the
summer or autumn” (Rog. Hov., iii. 134); and that she accepts April 27
as the date of the archbishop’s arrival (ii. 298).
[445] “Legationis suæ officium per mortem Romani pontificis exspirasse.”
[446] This suggestion is strongly supported by the fact, which has been
overlooked, that the bishop of Worcester was consecrated by Longchamp
“adhuc legato” on May 5 (Ric. Devizes, p. 403); that the chancellor
still styled himself legate on May 13 (‘Ancient Charters,’ p. 96); and
that he even used this style on July 8 at Lincoln (_vide infra_).
This implies, as I pointed out so far back as 1888 in my ‘Ancient
Charters’ (Pipe Roll Society), that he continued to use the style
after Clement’s death and before he could have known whether Cœlestine
would renew it to him or not. Indeed, if we may trust the version of
Giraldus, he was using it even so late as July 30 (iv. 389). It is
notable that in a communication dated “Teste meipso apud Releiam xxv
die Augusti,” he no longer employs it.
[447] England under the Angevin Kings, ii. 299.
[448] 9th Report Historical MSS., i. 35 _b_ (where the document is
dated “1190–1196”).
[449] 35th Report of Deputy Keeper, p. 2.
[450] This cannot be made public till my Calendar of Charters preserved
in France is issued. In it this evidence will be found in Document 61
(p. 17).
[451] The dating clause at its end is a blunder admitted on all sides.
[452] Preface to Rog. Hov., III. p. lxiv. This is, according to me, the
imaginary conference.
[453] Rog. Hov., iii. 135 note. So also ‘Gesta,’ ii. p. 208: “in which
John was recognised as the heir of England.”
[454] Pref. to Rog. Hov., III. lix.
[455] Ibid. p. lxiv.
[456] Gesta, ii. 207–8; Will. Newb., ii. 339.
[457] Roger Hov., iii. 135 note.
[458] Compare my ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ pp. 176, 183, with Hoveden’s
text.
[459] “Resaisina vicecomitatus Lincolnie _fiet_ Girardo de
Camvilla: et eadem die dies ei conveniens _præfigetur_ standi in
curia domini regis ad judicium. Quod si contra eum monstrari poterit
quod judicio curiæ domini regis vicecomitatum vel castellum Lincolnie
perdere debuerit, perdat; sin minus retineat; nisi interim alio modo
pax inde fieri poterit.”
[460] “Girardo de Camvilla in gratiam cancellarii recepto, remansit
illi in bono et pace custodia castri de Lincolnia.”
[461] Compare Rog. Hov., III. lxiv., _ut supra_, and the ‘Histoire
de Guillaume le Maréchal,’ ll. 11,888–11,882:
“Je entent e vei
Que par dreit, si’n sui aseiir,
Le [rei] devom nos faire de Artur.”
[462] Compare my article on “Historical Research” in ‘Nineteenth
Century,’ December, 1898.
[463] Archæological Journal, L. 247–263.
[464] Const. Hist., iii. 568.
[465] Mr. Loftie writes, in his ‘London,’ that “in the reign of Henry
I. we find the guild in full possession of the governing rights which
are elsewhere attributed to a guild merchant” (p. 30). See also p. 103
above.
In the same series, Dean Kitchin applies this assumption to Winchester,
and observes of the “Knights,” who possessed a ‘hall’ there under
Henry I., that “if we may argue from the parallel of the London
Knights’ Guild, the body had the charge of the city, and was in fact
the original civic corporation of Winchester,” (‘Historic Towns:
Winchester,’ p. 74).
[466] See ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville.’
[467] “Nunc primum in sibi indulta conjuratione regno regem deesse
cognovit Londonia, quam nec rex ipse Ricardus, nec prædecessor et
p. ter ejus Henricus pro mille millibus marcarum argenti fieri
permisisset” (Richard of Devizes, p. 416).
[468] “Facta conjuratione adversus eam quam cum honore susceperunt cum
dedecore apprehendere statuerunt” (See ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p.
115).
[469] See note above.
[470] Const. Hist., i. 407.
[471] “Facta conspiratione quam communionem vocabant sese omnes pariter
sacramentis adstringunt et ... ejusdem regionis proceres, quamvis
invitos, sacramentis suae conspirationis obligari compellunt.”
[472] See my paper in ‘Academy’ of 12th November, 1887.
[473] Transactions of the London and Middlesex Arch. Soc., v. 286.
[474] Ibid. p. 286–7.
[475] Mr. Loftie’s argument (‘London,’ p. 53) that Glanville’s words
prove that London, if not other towns as well, had already a ‘Commune’
under Henry II. is disposed of by Dr. Gross (‘The Gild Merchant,’ i.
102).
[476] £125 and £5 10_s._ respectively for a quarter in 19 Hen. II.
p. 183, and £375 and £16 10_s._ respectively for three-quarters in
20 Hen. II. (p 7).
[477] ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ p. 297.
[478] 20 Hen. II., p. 9. The official list (Deputy Keeper’s 31st
Report) omits to mention that they answered “ut custodes” for this
quarter.
[479] ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ pp. 297–8.
[480] On the _firma burgi_ see Stubbs, ‘Const. Hist.’ (1874), p.
410; and Maitland, ‘Domesday Book and Beyond,’ pp. 204–5.
[481] Compare the ‘Dialogus’: “De summa vero summarum quæ ex omnibus
fundis surgebat in uno comitatu constituerunt vicecomitem illius
comitatus ad scaccarium teneri” (i. 4).
[482] Op. cit. _ut supra_.
[483] 21 Henry II., pp. 15–17. For the last quarter of the 20th year
they were £59 8_s._ 2_d._
[484] From the county the proceeds must always have been small owing to
the absence of royal manors.
[485] Pipe Rolls, _passim_.
[486] They had paid out £156 7_s._ 4_d._ in the three quarters, and
owed £9 9_s._ 9_d._, making a total of £165 17_s._ 1_d._, or at the
rate of about £221 a year, as against some £238.
[487] His outgoings were £151 4_s._ 6_d._, and he was credited with a
“superplus” of £13 8_s._ 10_d._ ‘blank.’ This works out at rather over
£548 “numero” for the year, the old figure being £547 “numero” (these
figures are taken from the unpublished Pipe Roll of 1176). It would
be rash to connect the change with the severe Assise of Northampton
without further evidence.
[488] An entry on the Roll of 15 Hen. II. records it as £500 “blanch,”
plus a varying sum of about £20 “numero.”
[489] Add. MS. 14,252, fo. 112 _d_.
[490] MS.: ‘skiuin.’ The ‘Liber Albus’ (pp. 423–4) uses “eskevyn” for
the _échevins_ of Amiens.
[491] _i.e._ Queen Eleanor.
[492] Walter archbishop of Rouen.
[493] “For their administration and judicial functions in continental
towns, see Giry, ‘St. Quentin,’ 28–67; von Maurer, ‘Stadtverf.,’ i.
241, 568” (‘Gild Merchant,’ i. 26 note).
[494] Add. MS. 14,252, fo. 110.
[495] Liber de Antiquis Legibus (Camden Soc.), p. 2.
[496] London and the Kingdom (1894), i. 72.
[497] London (1887), p. 45.
[498] History of London, i. 190.
[499] Liber Albus, i. 41.
[500] “Quicumque predictorum, sine licentia majoris abierit de
congregacione aliorum, tantundem paccabit,” etc. (‘Établissements,’ §
4).
[501] “Si quid major celari preceperit, celabunt. Hoc quicunque
detexerit, a suo officio deponetur,” etc. (‘Établissements,’ § 2).
[502] See Liber Albus, i. 307–8.
[503] Compare the case quoted in Palgrave’s ‘Commonwealth,’ II. p.
clxxxiii.
[504] Arch. Journ., ix. 70.
[505] Ibid. p. 81.
[506] Historic Towns: Winchester, p. 166.
[507] In his valuable ‘Étude sur les origines de la commune de St.
Quentin,’ M. Giry has shown that this early example, with those derived
from it, was distinguished by the separate existence and status of the
_échevins_. Nor have the _Établissements_ as much in common
with the London _commune_ as those of Rouen.
[508] Archæological Journal, L. 256–260.
[509] Feudal England, 552 _et seq._
[510] Norgate’s ‘England under the Angevin Kings,’ i. 48–9.
[511] These passages are quoted to show that the influence of Rouen on
London is admitted by an independent writer.
[512] ‘Les Établissements de Rouen’ (Bibliothèque de l’école des
hautes études, publiée sous les auspices du Ministère de l’instruction
publique, 1883).
[513] He became, in that year, bishop of Lisieux.
[514] I am in a position to date this charter precisely as at or about
Feb., 1175.
[515] Recurring, in his “Conclusions” at the end of the volume, to
this question of date, M. Giry seems to combine two of his different
limits: “L’étude du texte nous a permis de fixer la rédaction des
Établissements aux dernières années du règne de Henri II., après 1169.
Nous savons, de plus que La Rochelle les avait adoptés avant 1199, que
Rouen les avait également possédés vers la même époque, entre 1177 et
1183” (p. 427). Of these dates, I can only repeat that “1183” has its
origin in an error; “1177” is, I think, a mistake, and “1169” difficult
to understand. My forthcoming calendar of charters in France will throw
fresh light upon the date.
[516] Ancient Deeds, A. 1477.
[517] Sheriff of London 1174–6. Also Alderman (Palgrave, II. clxxxiii.).
[518] Cot. MS. Faust, B. ii., fo. 66 _d_.
[519] Add. MS. 14,252, fo. 106.
[520] “Major debet custodire claves civitatis et cum assensu parium
talibus hominibus tradere in quibus salve sint.
“Si aliquis se absentaverit de excubia ipse erit in misericordia
majoris secundum quod tunc fuerit magna necessitas excubandi”
(‘Établissements de Rouen,’ ii. 44).
[521] Add. MS. 14,252, fo. 106.
[522] MS. ‘escauingores.’
[523]? consilio.
[524] Add. MS. 14,252, fo. 126.
[525] The ‘th’ in the first ‘Spelethorn’ is an Anglo-Saxon character.
[526] This is the “Terra Roberti Fafiton” (at Stepney) of Domesday, i.
130.
[527] Cf. Domesday, i. 128.
[528] Rectius “Hendune.”
[529] From Domesday Book.
[530] This may be chiefly due to omitting “Mimms” (70 hides) and
reckoning Ossulston at 20 hides too much.
[531] The Red Book of the Exchequer (Rolls Series), pp. 469–574.
[532] Mr. Hall has since, in the ‘Athenæum’ (10th Sept., 1898),
repeated the view that the ‘Red Book’ returns were “made in the two
preceding years.”
[533] It will be found on p. 296 of the printed text.
[534] “Idem rex præcepit omnibus vicecomitibus ut confiscarentur
redditus et omnia beneficia clericorum data eis a Stephano
archiepiscopo et ab episcopis Angliæ moram facientibus in transmarinis
post interdictum Anglicanæ ecclesiæ, in hæc verba:
“‘Præcipimus vobis quod capiatis ... et scire faciatis distincte
in crastino Sancti Johannis Baptistæ anno regni nostri xiv
baronibus nostris de scaccario ubi fuerint redditus illi et
quantum singuli valeant et qui illi sunt qui eos receperunt.
Datum vii id. Junii’” (p. 267).
It is noteworthy that the returns to both writs were to be due on the
same day (June 25), which accounts for their commixture in the ‘Testa.’
The remarkable rapidity with which such returns could be made to a
royal writ should be carefully observed.
[535] “Per veredictum” (printed in ‘Testa’ “per unum dictum”).
[536] Testa de Nevill, pp. 401–408.
[537] This corrupt list in the ‘Liber Rubeus’ is evidently akin to
a similarly corrupt one interpolated in the ‘Testa’ (p. 408), as is
proved by this name.
[538] Testa, 268 _b_; Liber Rubeus, 499.
[539] Compare the wording of the writ of 1212: “Inquiri facias ... de
tenementis ... que sint data vel alienata,” etc. (see p. 266, above).
[540] ‘Liber Rubeus,’ p. 466. I have specially examined the Pipe Rolls
for evidence on this tenure, and find that Sewal received the rents up
to Easter, 1210, and Philip de Ulcote after that date.
[541] Would it, in any country but England, be possible for an editor
who prints, without correcting, these gems to lecture before a
university on the treatment of mediæval MSS.?
[542] The ‘Red Book’ lists, though so inferior, are more in number than
those in the ‘Testa.’
[543] For instance, that which relates to Winchester (p. 236 _a_)
would elude all but close investigation. It records _inter alia_
the interesting gift, by Henry II., of land there “Wassall’ cantatori.”
This would seem to be the earliest occurrence of the word “Wassail” (in
a slightly corrupt form).
[544] Mr. Hall himself admits that their heading in the ‘Red Book’ “can
be verified neither from the external evidence of Records, nor ... on
the authority of the original Returns, no single specimen of which is
known to have been preserved” (pp. ccxxii.).
[545] It might be added that, as in 1166 and 27 Hen. III., the returns
on such Inquests were made at one time, and did not extend (as the ‘Red
Book’ date implies) over two or three years.
[546] This, as its grave and alarming feature, is the one selected for
mention in the Waverley Annals.
[547] “Omnimodis tenementis infra burgum sive extra,” ran the writ.
The elaborate returns for Stamford and Wallingford in the ‘Testa’
illustrate this side of the Inquest. Reference should also be made to
the interesting return for Yarmouth (‘Testa,’ p. 296):
“Nullum tenementum est in Jernemuth’ quod antiquitus no’
(_sic_) tenebatur de domino Rege aut de progenitoribus
domini Regis, regibus Angl[iæ] quod sit datum vel alienatum
aliquo modo quo minus de domino Rege teneatur in capite et illi
quibus tenementa sunt data faciunt plenar[ie] servicium domino
Regi de tenementis illis,” etc.
The close concordance of this return with the king’s writ ordering it
(see p. 226) is remarkable.
[548] See p. 265 above.
[549] Testa de Nevill, p. 361.
[550] Salop only.
[551] Honour of Wallingford.
[552] Begins with twelfth entry on page 128_a_, though there is no
break there in printed text; the ‘Liber Rubeus’ (p. 513) has entries
for Berkshire.
[553] Borough of Wallingford.
[554] Including town of Oxford.
[555] The Chichester Inquest at least.
[556] 15 entries.
[557] Hyde Abbey.
[558] Beginning at “Abbas de Sancto Walerico.”
[559] Ending with entry for ‘Uggel.’ A special Inquest for Writtle is
comprised.
[560] Beginning with “Candeleshou Wap’n’.”
[561] Including a special Inquest for Stamford.
[562] Beginning at “Carissimis.”
[563] Ending with an Inquest for Newcastle-on-Tyne.
[564] Rightly given as “Fouberd” on p. 708; wrongly as “Roberti” on pp.
616, 719. Mr. Hall has failed to observe that Robert is an error, and
one which throws some light on the MS.
[565] The order is not quite the same in the first of these three lists.
[566] Mediæval Military Architecture (1884), ii. 10.
[567] Cinque Ports (1888), p. 66.
[568] Compare ‘Geoffrey de Mandeville,’ pp. 326–7.
[569] Freeman’s ‘Norman Conquest,’ following William of Poitiers.
[570] Genealogist, N. S., xii. 147.
[571] Lib. Rub., p. ccxl.
[572] English Historical Review, Oct., 1890 (v. 626–7).
[573] Forty years ago an able northern antiquary, Mr. Hodgson
Hinde, who was well acquainted with early records, and knew these
entries in the ‘Red Book,’ devoted sections of his work (Hodgson’s
‘Northumberland,’ part i., pp. 258–261, 261–263) to “cornage” and to
“castle-ward,” but was careful not to confuse them.
[574] From which they were printed by Hodgson Hinde in his preface to
the Cumberland Pipe Rolls.
[575] The ‘Red Book’ (p. 714) reads: “Summa xviij _l._ iiij _s._ vj
_d._, videlicet, xxij _d._ plus quam alii solebant respondere.” But I
make the real total of its items, not £18 4_s._ 6_d._, but £18 6_s._
6_d._ The two pardons, amounting to £2 17_s._ 4_d._, brought up the
total to £21 3_s._ 10_d._, but, owing to the above wrong ‘summa,’ the
scribe made it only £21 1_s._ 10_d._ He then further omitted the odd
pound, and so obtained his “xxij _d._”
[576] These charters were unknown to Mr. Hodgson Hinde (‘The Pipe Rolls
... for Cumberland, Westmoreland, and Durham,’ 1857), p. xxvii. In
addition to the section on “the Noutgeld or Cornage Rent” in this work
(pp. xxvii.-xxix.), cornage is dealt with _ut supra_ in Hodgson’s
‘Northumberland,’ part i. pp. 258 _et seq._, and in ‘The Boldon
Buke’ (1852), pp. lv.-lvi. There is also printed in Brand’s ‘Newcastle’
a valuable detailed list of the cornage rents payable to the Prior of
Tynemouth, which greatly exceeded his “pardoned” quota.
[577] Harl. MS. 434, fo. 18.
[578] ‘Boldon Buke’ (Surtees Soc.), _passim_.
[579] ‘Durham Feodarium’ (Surtees Soc.), p. 145.
[580] ‘Boldon Buke’ (Surtees Soc.), pp. 36–7.
[581] Feudal England, pp. 289–293.
[582] Even Mr. Oman, though most reluctant to adopt any conclusion of
mine, appears, in his ‘History of the Art of War’ (1898), to admit that
I am right in this. Sir James Ramsay also adopts my conclusion in his
‘Foundations of England’ (1898), ii. 132.
[583] Stubbs’ ‘Const. Hist.,’ ii. 422, 433.
[584] Maxwell Lyte’s ‘History of the University of Oxford’ (1886), pp.
93–96.
[585] Annals of Edward I. and Edward II. (Rolls Series), ii. 201.
[586] Ibid. p. 203. It will be observed that this description of
the Scots--“quasi sepes densa”--is an admirable parallel to the
metaphor--“quasi castellum”--which Henry of Huntingdon applies to the
English “acies” at the Battle of Hastings, and which Mr. Freeman so
deplorably misunderstood (‘Feudal England,’ p. 343–4). So, too, Adam de
Murimuth speaks of the French fleet at the Battle of Sluys (1340) as
“quasi castrorum acies (or aciem) ordinatum” (p. 106). Such metaphors,
I have shown, were common.
[587] Vol. vii. p. 122.
[588] Vol. iii. p. xxi.
[589] History of England, p. 174.
[590] Mr. Oman reckons the men of the “Marcher Lords” at 1,850. I make
them 2,040.
[591] Ed. Record Commission.
[592] Except a special body of 100 men from the Forest of Dean whence
the necessary miners were always obtained.
[593] History of the Art of War, pp. 593–4.
[594] “Commissioners of Array for all counties citra Trent”
(Wrottesley’s ‘Creçy and Calais,’ p. 8; cf. Ibid. pp. 58–61).
[595] Ibid. pp. 67–8.
[596] Rotuli Scotiæ, i. p. 127.
[597] Since this was written Mr. Morris has independently observed that
40,000 or even 10,000 horse are impossible (‘Eng. Hist. Rev.,’ xiv.
133).
[598] I omit, as he does, in this reckoning, any contingents from
elsewhere.
[599] The italics are mine.
[600] The italics are mine.
[601] “The host was told off into ten battles, probably (like the
French at Creçy) in three lines of three battles each, with the tenth
as a reserve under the king” (p. 574). But in the earlier plans the
English battles are shown in _single_ line, and in the earliest,
at least, with a widely extended front.
[602] The italics are mine.
[603] The italics are mine.
[604] Art of War in Middle Ages, 104; Social England,, ii. 174–176;
History of England, pp. 187–8; History of the Art of War, pp. 604–615.
[605] Mélanges Julien Havet: La date de la composition du ‘Modus
tenendi Parliamentum in Anglia’ (1895).
[606] M. Bémont, by a slip, describes him (p. 471), as “exerçant la
charge de grand connétable (_sic_) d’Angleterre au couronnement de
Richard II.”
[607] See Mr. Watson’s Note in ‘Complete Peerage,’ vi. p. 197.
[608] Ibid. v. p. 260; also Doyle’s ‘Official Baronage.’
[609] M. Bémont writes that he “vivait au temps de Richard II., non de
Henri II.” But this is a misconception.
[610] Hearne’s ‘Curious Discourses,’ ii. 90–97.
[611] Ibid. pp. 327–330.
[612] Rot. Chart., i. 46.
[613] M. Paris, ‘Chronica Majora.’
[614] Calendar of Patent Rolls, 1307–1313, p. 6.
[615] Ibid. p. 51.
[616] Const. Hist., ii. 328.
[617] He was one of those besieging him in Scarborough Castle, May,
1312.
[618] Ed. Hearne, p. 103.
[619] Dictionary of National Biography, li. 204.
[620] The matter has been further complicated by the index to the
official calendar of Edward II. Close Rolls, which gives a “Walter de
Ferrariis, marshal of England.” The document indexed proves (p. 189)
to be a reference (6th July, 1315) to Walter (earl of Pembroke), “late
marshal of England.”
[621] Trivet, it is true, even earlier (_circ._ 1300), wrote
of Strongbow as ‘Marshal of England’:--“Ricardus Comes de Strogoil,
marescallus Angliæ, terris suis omnibus propter quondam offensam in
manu regis acceptis, exsul in Hibernia moratur. Hunc Ricardum Anglici
ob præcipuum fortitudinem ‘Strangebowe’ cognominabant” (p. 66). But
although the writer may sometimes preserve a forgotten story, he cannot
be accepted as an authority for earl Richard’s tenure of an office, of
which there is absolutely no trace in any contemporary chronicle or
record.
[622] Dictionary of National Biography.
[623] Complete Peerage, vi. 197, 198.
[624] Now MS. Ar. xix. (Brit. Mus.).
[625] The italics and commas are mine, and show how the alleged son of
earl Richard was fabricated.
[626] Mr. Watson (‘Complete Peerage,’ vi. 197) states that Giraldus
Cambrensis speaks of “Richard Strongbow, earl of Strigul,” but this is
a misapprehension.
[627] Dictionary of Nat. Biography, p. 393.
[628] It was inspected by Edw. I. at Carlisle, 20th March, 1307. Its
mention (‘Mon. Ang.’ v. 268) of “Gilberti et Ricardi Strongbowe”
clearly proves that it applied the name to both.
[629] Hearne’s ‘Discourses,’ ii. 132–4; ‘Calendar of Close Rolls,’
p. 558. The reply is of interest as showing that they identified the
marshalship of England with that in the “Constitutio.”
[630] Hearne’s ‘Discourses,’ ii. 135–7. This petition, in
Norman-French, is of interest for certain additions and for the loose
use of “countes mareschauls” as the title of his predecessors from the
first.
[631] Ibid. pp. 143–5.
[632] Altered in MS.
[633] 133 in the pencil numbering.
[634] In special classes on Palæography and Diplomatic at the London
School of Economics.
[635] See ‘Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer,’ p. 34, where the
reference is to Mr. Hall’s citing the “pr_æ_missa scutagia” of his
MS. as “pr_o_missa scutagia” (pp. clxxii., clxxvii., etc.), and
arguing therefrom. See also Ibid. p. 29.
[636] “There is a treatise carryed about the office of the earle
marshall in the tyme of King Henry the Second, and another of the tyme
of Thomas of Brotherton” (Hearne’s ‘Discourses,’ II. 95).
[637] The Society of Antiquaries possesses an early English version
of the ‘Modus’ to which is prefixed a table of chapters both for the
‘Modus’ and for the treatise on the Marshal’s office.
[638] He was earl of Norfolk.
[639] Vol v. pp. 260, 261.
[640] “Sciatis quod, cum carissimum fratrem nostrum Thomam de Holand,
comitem Kancie de _officio marescalli Angl[ie]_, quod nuper
habuit ex concessione nostra, exoneraverimus, Nos ea de causa dilectum
consanguineum et fidelem nostrum Thomam Comitem Notyngh’ ad _dictum
officium_ ordinavimus, habendum cum feodis et omnibus aliis ad
officium illud spectantibus ad totam vitam ipsius,” etc. (Pat. 9 Ric.
II., part 1, m. 38).
[641] Dictionary of National Biography.
[642] Dictionary of National Biography.
[643] The witnesses were the archbishop of Canterbury, the bishops of
London and Winchester, John of Gaunt, the dukes of York and Gloucester,
the earls of Arundel, Stafford, and Suffolk, Hugh de Segrave the
treasurer and John de Montacute steward of the household.
[644] p. 311 above.
[645] It seems to have become in the Parliamentary confirmation of 1397
“Earl Marshal of England.”
[646] Mr. Kingsford, in the ‘Dictionary of National Biography’ (xxxvi.
232), complicates the matter further by writing of Walter earl of
Pembroke: “The office of Marshal passed through his eldest daughter to
the Bigods, earls of Norfolk, and through them to the Mowbrays, and
eventually to the Howards,” etc. The Mowbrays, of course, obtained it
under a new creation, and in no way through the Bigods.
[647] Derby was the Steward’s son and heir.
[648] Dr. Stubbs observes that “from the king’s later action, it
is clear that both parties had in view the measures taken for the
deposition of Edward II.” But there is more direct evidence. On the
Rolls of Parliament (III. 376) it is one of the charges against the
Lords Appellant that they “firent chercher Recordes deins votre
Tresoree de temps le roi Edward vostre besaiel coment vostre dit
besaiel demist de sa Couronne, Et monstrerent en escript a Vous,” etc.,
etc.
[649] M. Bémont, who approached the question from the standpoint of
the MSS., claimed that only one (Vesp. B. vii.) of them could possibly
be as old as the days of Edward II., and that even this must be proved
“par des raisons paléographiques.” The officials of the MS. department,
Brit. Mus., kindly examined it for me, and pronounced it to be clearly
of the reign of Richard II., which confirms his conclusion. M. Bémont,
however, held that the MSS. “ont été composés et écrits dans les
premières années de Richard II., ou dérivent de manuscrits rédigés à
cette époque,” on account of the prominent place assigned in them to
Richard’s coronation. I should place the date a few years later.
[650] “The Present Status and Prospects of Historical Study” (‘Lectures
in Mediæval and Modern History,’ pp. 41–2).
[651] See my article on “Historical Research,” in ‘Nineteenth Century,’
December, 1898.
Transcriber’s Notes:
1. Obvious printers’, punctuation and spelling errors have been
corrected silently.
2. Some hyphenated and non-hyphenated versions of the same words have
been retained as in the original.
3. Superscripts are represented using the caret character, e.g. D^r. or
X^{xx}.
4. Italics are shown as _xxx_.
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